AROTR History
Past Events
2024: May 23-27
Despite some weather delays, we had amazing shows by The Fab Four, Jan & Dean’s Beach Party, The Cyrkle, Tony Kishman’s Live and Let Die, Peaceful Easy Eagles Tribute, Classicstone, Brooke Wright as Elvis Presley, and so much more!
2023: May 25-29
Headliners: Micky Dolenz: the Voice of the Monkees, Back2Mac, BritBeat, Live and Let Die: The Music of Paul McCartney featuring Tony Kishman, Classicstone
2022: May 26-30
Celebrating our 20th anniversary with Tommy James & The Shondells, The Cyrkle, the LOVE album concert, and 200 concerts.
2021: Sept 2-6
2021 was still uncertain with COVID affecting our everyday lives, so we postponed AROTR to Labor Day weekend. The event featured The Fab Four, Peter Asher, Laurence Juber and Jefferson Starship.
2021: May 28-30, Penny Lane at the Park
2021 caused us to postpone AROTR to Labor Day weekend. But in April, we decided we could put on a safe event, so we created Penny Lane at the Park, a two-day mini-festival and Hard Days Night did a bonus Rooftop Concert!
2020: Oct 9 & 10, JL80
We celebrated John Lennon’s 80th birthday virtually with livestreams, interviews with our bands, Zoom rooms, a candlelight vigil, and raised $3500 in our “Lennon-Aid” campaign.
2020: May 23-24
“the one that didn’t happen”
In 2020, COVID happened and the event didn’t, but we hosted a virtual event online.
2019: May 23-27
2019 was the last full event before COVID. This year marked 50 years since 1969. We celebrated with tributes to Woodstock, The Who’s Tommy, Crosby Stills & Nash, Abbey Road album. And a special “Abbey Road on the Dark Side” concert.
2018: May 24-28
Highlights: America, Vanilla Fudge, Geoff Emerick, Top 100 Beatles Songs, the LOVE Album Concert, Muscle Shoals for Rubber Souls. Plus we re-created Dion’s “Abraham Martin and John".
2017: May 25-29
Our first year in Jeffersonville, IN!
Highlights: Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits, Peter Asher, Denny Laine, The Family Stone, The Grass Roots, Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere & The Raiders, Jake Clemmons Band, Ambrosia.
2016: May 26-30
When All You Need Is Love performed the complete White Album, we surprised Andy and brought Prudence Farrow on stage so he could sing Dear Prudence, to Prudence.
2015: May 26-28
The Orchestra, the successor band to ELO, was the big get for us this year, and they were as good as all the ELO records.
2014: May 22-26
3 Events this year!
2014 was the 50th anniversary of 'the boys' coming to America, so we knew we needed to make it a spectacular celebration. I thought, "why not go for The Beach Boys?"
2013: May 23-27
Featuring Denny Laine, Leon Russell, and Peter Noone, and a memorable concert from Gavin Pring, Graham Alexander, and Nube 9.
2012: May 26-30
This was the first time we had had a national headliner this big, and after Jefferson Starship played both Louisville and D.C., we knew that we were always going to have renowned headliners.
2011: May 26-30
Our featured shows included All You Need is Love, Abbey Road LIVE!, Drew Harrison, and The Repeatles.
2010: May 27-31
We had close to 70 bands in 2010. Some of the real highlights were the Sun Kings, the Tearaways, The Beat Radicals, The English Channel, and Alyona, who teamed up with Wonderwall to do the complete Across The Universe soundtrack.
2009: May 21-25
For the 40th anniversary of Abbey Road, Hal Bruce with The Backwards and Rachel Blanton created an amazing concert called Abbey Road Supersized.
2008: May 22-26
We tested the Brian Epstein stage "Where New Music Goes to Get Discovered," and a lot of great young talent took the stage!
2007: May 24-28
2007 was the introduction of LOVE. LOVE was born as a true labor of LOVE, dreamed up and put together by a group of musicians who had never before played together.
2006: May 26-28
Just before I moved my end of the event back to Cleveland, with the help of some incredible people, I was able to keep the party going in Louisville.
2005: May 27-29
It’s funny the doubters told me that Louisville was all Bluegrass and no one would come because on Memorial Day Weekend everyone goes to the lake. I thought, "everybody does not go to the lake, and there are 3 billion Beatles fans."
2004: August 6-8
2004 was such a pivotal year; the 40th anniversary of the Beatles touring America, and we were able to move our event to historic Public Hall Auditorium, the same stage that The Beatles performed on in 1964.
2003: August 8-10
The fantasy reunion concert featuring Tim Piper, Lawrence Macca, Pete Santora, and Jim “Ringo” Martin was the closest thing to what The Beatles might have looked and sounded like at age 50.
2002: August 9-11
There was nothing like that first one. The uncertainty of not knowing if any of you would come (or would Apple or EMI shut us down before we opened?). And then to have it be such a magical musical experience for Cleveland, Ohio the 12,000 who took the chance.