Pharrell’s Something in the Water festival canceled due to coronavirus

The Virginia Beach festival plans to return in April 2021.

Published March 13, 2020 by Heather B. Hayes / Richard Foster

Virginia Beach’s Something in the Water 2020 festival has been canceled due to the growing coronavirus crisis. It will return on April 23-25, 2021, according to organizers.

The brainchild of Grammy-winning musician and Virginia Beach native Pharrell Williams, the festival premiered in spring 2019, selling 35,000 tickets and drawing crowds of 12,000 to 15,000 people each of the three days of the concerts.

“After much consideration, in partnership with the city of Virginia Beach, we’ve sadly decided to postpone Something in the Water 2020,” read a statement posted to the festival’s Twitter account. “All tickets for 2020 will be honored for next year’s festival. Purchasers will be notified by Friday March 20th on how to obtain a refund if they are unable to attend.”

The 2019 Something in the Water festival yielded a $21.8 million economic impact for Virginia Beach in 2019 and another $2.4 million financial boost to the larger Hampton Roads region, according to an analysis conducted by Vinod Agarwal, professor of economics at Old Dominion University. He had predicted that the economic impact would at least double in 2020.

The 2020 SITW festival was slated to run for an entire week, with the number of beachfront concert stages increasing from one to three. Event officials planned to sell 60,000 tickets for the festival, which was to feature more than 60 top and emerging acts, including Usher, the Foo Fighters, A$AP Rocky — and of course, Williams himself. Celebrities such as Taraji P. Henson, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Tony Hawk and Sheila E were also scheduled to appear at SITW 2020.