Pine Knob Music Theatre is back!

New Pine Knob Music Theatre logo. Courtesy image.

By Gordon Berg

Wow. February already. Let’s check in with how 2022 is going so far. COVID-19 is still around. (Ugh.) Our nation is still deeply divided. (Sigh.) The cost of a good burger is more than it oughta be. (Where’s the beef?!)

But when I read that one of my favorite concert venues on the planet is going back to its roots … all was right with the world!

When it opened in the summer of 1972, with teen idol David Cassidy, the Pine Knob Music Theatre became an instant gem. Chicago played there 70 times. Bob Seger rocked the house with 33 sold-out shows!

For those who may be unfamiliar with Pine Knob, it is a 15,000-plus seat, open-air concert venue nestled next to a skiing resort in the woods just north of Detroit. Each show felt like a beautiful event under a summer night’s sky. Pretty much every great performer did a gig there at some point in their career. Just the limited list of the people I saw in the ‘70s through the 2000s gives you an idea of the range of talent who performed there: Stray Cats, The Beach Boys, Linda Ronstadt, The Eagles, John Denver, Dan Fogelberg, Boz Skaggs, Aerosmith, Blink 182, Jimmy Buffett, Isaac Hayes, Raffi, Arlo Guthrie, Pete Seeger and even Bob Hope.

But on January 25, 2001, the Pine Knob Music Theatre itself was sold out. DTE Energy purchased the naming rights from Palace Sports and Entertainment for a cool million dollars per year.

Ooof. It felt as though the energy conglomerate had just sucked all the warmth out of one of the coolest venues in Michigan.

But on January 14, 2022 — in the middle of COVID-19, divisiveness and beef shortages — the planets lined up again. Gone was DTE Energy Music Theatre. This beloved venue returned to its roots. The newly renamed Pine Knob Music Theatre was back!

Every concert at Pine Knob I attended has a treasured memory tied to it. But of all the performances I experienced, there is no richer memory than the time my wife and I took my mom and dad to see The Carpenters at Pine Knob one magical summer night in July 1975. Wow! I just detected significant communal eye roll from our readers. And had I not been there, I might have joined you. But, read on…

Blue eyes

Let me set the stage for you. My dad was a huge Carpenters fan. More specifically, he loved Karen Carpenter. He had been anticipating this concert ever since my wife and I gave Mom and Dad tickets for Father’s Day. It’s all he talked about.

It was a perfect summer night. Our seats were about 15 rows from the stage. Four seats off the aisle. Amazing! Dad let us take our seats first. His was the seat next to the aisle.

Around 8 p.m., the house lights went down, the stage lights came up and there were The Carpenters! Song after song. Hit after hit. Story after story. They had the audience as they say, in the palm of their hands.

One of their gold-record singles was “Sing”, a song written by Joe Raposa for the children’s show Sesame Street. To everyone’s surprise, the house lights came up again. Karen stepped down from the stage to perform this song in the audience. As she made her way up the aisle, she held the mic for people to sing the first line of the chorus, “Sing, sing a song.”

She was about to make her way back to the stage when she caught my dad’s bright blue eyes. He was beaming at her. Making her way to him, she sang, “Sing, sing a song.” Dad, without missing a beat, sang back to her as she held the mic for him. And then, something unexpected happened that forever became part of family legend. Karen Carpenter bent down and kissed my dad’s forehead!

Encore, encore

The rest of the concert was a blur. We were each replaying that moment over and over again in our minds. Most of all … Dad.

One act of kindness lasting, maybe, only 15 seconds. And yet, a lifetime. And it all happened at Pine Knob. It was magic.

Thank you, Pine Knob. Thanks for restoring a memory so endearing. Dad is gone. So is Karen Carpenter. So, it’s really something to have you back again. Have a great summer, my old friend.

Editor’s Note: Do you have a Pine Knob story? Please share it with us! Send an email about your experience to Contact Us. We will publish the best stories in future issues. Look for this story online to post a comment about it or about Pine Knob, in general.

Gordon Berg is a descendant of Manistee’s Bergs, Swansons and Martinsons. His debut book, “Harry and the Hurricane”, is about his father’s life as a young boy and how he survived the Miami Hurricane of 1926. More at: www.harryandthehurricane.com