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Economy Takes 'Fever' Out Of Country Fest


PRYOR, OK (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — Festival organizers announced that Country Fever, Oklahoma's prestigious outdoor country music event, will idle in 2010 amidst a challenging economy. The Pryor, Oklahoma festival, established in 2003 and holding a rich history of headlining some of the biggest names in country music like Toby Keith, Brooks & Dunn, and Reba McIntyre, will take a year off in order to re-assess the direction of the event.

"We've had tremendous success with Country Fever over the years, and we thought long and hard about continuing in some fashion this year, as well," commented festival co-organizer and President of the Catch the Fever festival site, Mark Nuessle. "But in listening to our long-standing customers and watching the slowly recovering economy, the Country Fever partners and I agreed that our best move was to wait until 2011."

Country Fever has faced open challenges in the last few years with shrinking attendance, lessening sponsor commitments due to the economic climate, and increasing artist performance fees. All of these things, combined with the very real financial hardships facing a majority of the festival's fans, led to the decision.

Nuessle went on to add, "The Country Fever 'die-hards' have been so incredibly supportive over the last seven years, and this is one of the hardest decisions we've ever had to make since creating this festival. And in the end, our only hope is that those loyal friends and will understand why we made this choice and will be back to support us next year."

"We've been fortunate enough to begin work recently with an outside company to begin to re-tool our other festivals to be formidable events for years to come," said Dave Gienke, festival co-organizer and director of Country Fever's operations. "Our belief is that we will do the same with Country Fever and return in 2011 with an amazing lineup, an incredible slate of sponsors, and a country festival experience that will be like no other!" –by CelebrityAccess Staff Writers