Tyler Park

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Tyler Park will soon have a new place to catch a show or listen to some jazz.

The Olmsted Parks Conservancy announced Tuesday it will build a new outdoor stage at the park in the Highlands. It will be located just inside the western entrance of the park near the intersection of Castlewood Avenue and Tyler Park Drive.

"The COVID-19 pandemic was so hard on local musicians and venues," Layla George, president and CEO of the Olmsted Parks Conservancy, said in a news release Tuesday. "While the community rediscovered the importance of the arts, we also renewed our relationship with the parks and their value as community-building spaces. The Tyler Park stage will truly connect nature and neighborhood and showcase the creativity that makes the Highlands so special."

The project will be funded through a donation from a long-time park supporter.

J.K. McKnight, who founded the Forecastle Festival in Louisville, worked with Olmsted and the Tyler Park neighborhood on the project.

"The Highlands has always been a creative nerve center of our city, a place that has inspired countless artists and entrepreneurs like me to dream and do," McKnight said in a news release. "To foster, grow and retain our creative class, we need public stages like this that attract, coalesce and ignite our creative community.

"Like trees planted decades ago, it's important that we invest time and energy to replenish our neighborhoods with the assets that make them desirable places to live, work and play. Without Tyler Park, Forecastle Festival never would have happened. Today we turn the tide, open a new chapter, and reverse the trajectory. I'm excited for what that is going to mean for our artists, neighbors and community."

The stage will serve as the home base for the Tyler Park Jazz Series and will also make way for more festivals and concerts.

"This new improvement will establish Tyler Park as a hub for performing arts in the Highlands," Shawn Reilly, a past president of the Tyler Park Neighborhood Association, said in a news release. "We're excited the stage will be the home base for the Tyler Park Jazz Series, and will provide more opportunities for festivals, concerts, and other community building events. For over a century, music has been present in Tyler Park and we look forward to securing that tradition for a hundred more years."

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