McDonald and friends rock the Beachland

A crowd of more than 260 people packed the Beachland Ballroom & Tavern on Saturday night for the second Conservation Rocks! concert sponsored by the Land Conservancy.

The show featured musicians who also work in the field of local conservation, including the Land Conservancy’s Pete McDonald, who performed with Pete McDonald & the Black Oaks.  Other acts (click on video) were The Swamp Rattlers (featuring staffers from Geauga Park District), Fat City (with Harvey Webster of the Cleveland Museum of Natural History) and Drake Hollow featuring Steve Madewell (Lake Metroparks) and Al Bonnis (U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service).

“We had an absolute blast,” said McDonald, the Land Conservancy’s director of stewardship.

The event was designed to build awareness for the land conservation movement in northern Ohio.  About a half dozen local nonprofits had displays in the lobby of the Beachland.

In 2010, the inaugural Conservation Rocks! show featuring singer-songwriter Jason White drew a crowd of more than 220 people to the Beachland.

Western Reserve Land Conservancy, a nonprofit organization formed by the merger of eight local land trusts in 2006, has preserved more than 370 properties and more than 23,000 acres in a 14-county region in northern Ohio.

The Beachland Ballroom & Tavern, which is Cleveland’s most eclectic music club, opened in 2000.  It was built in 1950 as the Croatian Liberty Home, with the ballroom and tavern comprising the original structure.