GO Roadshow is “a musical street spectacle on wheels”. This show-making machine is a 34-foot long monster truck retrofitted with truck-horn calliope, a wall made of rotors and a spinning grand piano that is played while it wheels around! Each show starts with a shameless parade of peacock trumpets, spinning drums, accordion, sousaphone and glockenspiel.

GO is a music and art-mobile – a rolling ruckus that opens up like a mechanical blossom to make the street a vibrant place where people can share a community of the imagination. Night shows include video projected on a rotor screen made of movement itself, and on a blimp that has a mouth that opens in a call to celebration. We are drawing from the great American history of traveling circuses, Shriner and holiday parades, medicine shows, and used car lot events that vitalized the heartland of this country.

Visit our Store to purchase or download a CD of the music from this production.

Photos by John Altdorfer (1, 2, 4, 5, 9, 16, 18, 22, 23, 27, 28, 30), Eric Donny (15), Emily O’Donnell (6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17, 19, 20, 24, 29, 31, 32), Demmler Schenck (8), Cathleen Snow (3, 21, 25), Jennifer J. Wasco (26)

“Another popular event…a six-piece, art-rock band that performs on a 13-ton, 38 foot-long flatbed truck outfitted as a two-story stage. This carnival on wheels is billed as ‘Debussy meets Godzilla,’ with that singing-mouth blimp floating overhead.” – Boston Globe

“a musical street spectacle on wheels” – City Paper

“a theatrically minded art-rock concert performed on the back of a flatbed truck” – City Paper

“a carnivalesque cavalcade of spinning instruments, funny hats and cheerful rhythmic and melodic bombast” – City Paper

“Squonk Opera delivered a surreal dream to an appreciative crowd on the back of a flatbed truck.” – Post-Gazette

‘”the band known for its eye-catching thingamajigs”- Post-Gazette

Go to Media for full articles.

June 14-16, 2013
Columbia Festival of the Arts
Columbia, MD

July 18, 2013
The Freeman Stage at Bayside
Selbyville, DE (near Fenwick Island)

July 19-21, 2013
Baltimore Artscape
Baltimore, MD

August 16, 2013
Schenley Plaza
Pittsburgh, PA

The Artistic Directors
Steve O’Hearn & Jackie Dempsey

The Band

Keyboard & Accordion
Jackie Dempsey

Vocals
Anna Elder

Drums
Kevin Kornicki
Evan Lintz

Bass, Sousaphone
Nathan Wilson

Flutes, Sax, Truckhorn Calliope
Steve O’Hearn

Electric Guitar, Glockenspiel
David Wallace

The Team

Music
Jackie Dempsey

Design & Staging
Steve O’Hearn

Technical Direction
Todd Nonn

Video Design
Jessi Sedon-Essad with Buzz Miller

Lighting Design
Bob Steineck

Costume Design
Paula Ries

Stage Direction
Rick Kemp

Lyrics
Anna Elder

Graphic Design
David Wallace

Movement Consultation
Beth Corning

Production Stage Management
Dan Callery

Sound System Design & Engineering
George Powell
Wesley Conroy
Angela Baughman

Set & Prop Artists
Eve Bandi, Nick Bigatel, John Brucker, Dan Callery, Scott Conklin, Michael Essad,
Ryan Hadbavny, Chris & Robin Letzelter, Brad Litwin

Prop Master
Britton Mauk

Steve and Jackie would like to acknowledge everyone involved in this production
for their creative contributions, especially the Squonk musicians for adding their
own individual flavor to the music, and the designers, builders and technicians who
added detail and richness to the production.

This show can be set up almost anywhere a truck can go and has self-contained staging and technical systems and run crew. All staging, tech, video equipment, lighting equipment, sound equipment, kinetic properties and costumes are provided by the touring company. We require 6 double rooms at a local hotel for performers and technical staff.

The truck is 8’ x 35′ bumper to bumper. We put road-cones and caution tape/flags around the tech area, which ends up being about 50’ square. The top of the blimp is about 50’, and the top of truck frame is 12.5’ driving in, and 20’ on site once set up. Set up and strike requires 3 hours with several on-site volunteers.

We can provide a gas-powered generator that can supply enough power for daytime shows. Although we have soundproofed our generator, it does make noise, and we can use onsite electric. Nighttime shows require onsite electricity – complete specs can be found in our Tech rider, which will be uploaded soon to our Media page.

Artsplosure … Raleigh, NC
North Carolina Azalea Festival … Wilmington, NC
Mesa Arts Center … Mesa, AZ
FirstWorks Festival … Providence, RI
IngenuityFest … Cleveland, OH
Artscape … Baltimore, MD
Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival … Pittsburgh, PA
Schenley Plaza … Pittsburgh, PA
Mississippi School of the Arts … Brookhaven, MS
Greene County Fair … Waynesburg, PA
Mon County Fair … Morgantown, WV
The Fruit Tree Planting Foundation Events … Pittsburgh, PA
Citiparks Roving Art Cart Events … Pittsburgh, PA
A Fair in the Park … Pittsburgh, PA

Click to download pdf

A big Squonk Thank You to the following people who contributed to our Kickstarter campaign and helped to make GO Roadshow a reality. We hope you get a chance to see one of the shows!

We also wanted to thank Ron Thorpe of 2Cool Percussion for all of his help with our marching instruments.

Hotshot Squonk Trucker
Bill Schenck
Evan J. Segal

Squonk Road Dog
John R. Montgomery

Squonk Roadcrew
Patricia Miller
Demmler Schenck

Squonk Dispatcher
Sarah Carr
Denise
Kirsten Donny
Kate Freed & Jack Brice
Linda Gilmore
Ron Heller
Charlie Humphrey
Stacey Kranick
Bob Lacey
Marcia & Buzz Miller
Cooper Munroe
Tim O’Hearn
Sue O’Malley
Norman Papernick
Marybeth Rose
Caroline Savage
Kathy Sweeney
Jay Vaccaro

Squonk Flagger
Dwight Bishop
Sheena Calderwood
Jean Grace
Amy Kara Lewis
Rachel Myers
Sam Perry
Frank & Judy Petrich
Peggy Sutton
Mike Weis

Squonk Grease Monkey
Daniel Baselj
Colleen Daddario
Gina DeSimone
Zach Dorn
Susan Englert
Fink
Judith Galbraith
Paula Grooms
Gail Henry
Lynne Humphries-Russ
Rose Hutchinson
Brian Jose
Andrew Kaiser
Cameron Kaplan
Susan Keeler
Christopher Letzelter
William Mandicott
Carly McCoy
Lisa Newman
Joel Platt
Myshel Prasad
Bill Price
Daryl Putman
Peter Renfro
Rose Scilla
Mitch Swain
Nuiko Wadden
Rick Williams