The Lakes Area Music Festival has canceled their remaining 14 performances in their summer season through August 22 after two artists tested positive for COVID-19.

“100% of our artists were vaccinated,” said Lakes Area Music Festival Artistic and Executive Director Scott Lykins.

Lykins said the company even had plans in place like a mask requirement for artists and audiences, daily rapid COVID-19 testing, and even hiring a full-time COVID compliance officer.

Since the announcement was made last week, Lykins has received mostly positive feedback from the community, but he’s also received questions about why they took “such a dramatic measure for just two positive cases”.

“Artists are all staying in host families in the community, they are integrated with all the local businesses and restaurants in town, so there’s never really an end to the possible spread,” explained Lykins. “We know that there’s many people in our community who aren’t vaccinated, and we couldn’t take the risk of being the cause or a part of any kind of outbreak.”

The company will reimburse those who purchased tickets. They are already planning ahead for their winter series, which will feature nine shows that start in October.

By — Nick Ursini