Mars Music Hall will host the inaugural Huntsville Quarterly Music Meetup on March 3.

The free public event will give residents a look into the future of local entertainment as well as providing opinions to the nine-member Music Board for the first time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It’s exciting to have the opportunity to engage with the public after nearly two years of social distancing and lockdowns, which proved challenging for our music community,” Mayor Tommy Battle said. “The Music Board has done a lot of planning behind the scenes, and with our new Music Officer on board, I feel confident they’ll work well together to strike the right chord.”

The Music Meetup will also introduce the first full-time City Music Officer Matt Mandrella. Mayor Battle appointed Mandrella in January following a nationwide search.

“This will be my first opportunity to meet with members of the public and get their feedback on Huntsville’s music scene and what they want to see,” Mandrella said. “I hope we have a lot of interest in the event, and I look forward to hearing everyone’s thoughts.”

In the last few weeks since his posting he has met with many area entertainment providers including the Orion Amphitheater and the Huntsville-Madison County Convention Center & Visitors Bureau.

Huntsville began a partnership with the international consulting agency Sound Diplomacy in 2018 with the goal of taking the same skyrocketing engineering growth and applying it to the already established music industry.

Sound Diplomacy conducted a wide-ranging music audit during 2019 and recommended the creation of an area music board. Battle announced the appointment of Mark Torstenson as the first Music Board Chair in January 2020.

“Since our creation, the Music Board has created strategies and worked toward crafting policies with those goals in mind,” he said. “We look forward to sharing those with the public and seeing them come to fruition.”

The Music Meetup takes place 5:30-7:30 at 700 Monroe St. SW.