Stevie Nicks. Robert Plant. Neil Young. Phish, Lana Del Rey, Jack White. Weezer. Smashing Pumpkins. In Orion Amphitheater’s first four seasons, the venue hosted each of those legendary artists’ first ever concerts in Huntsville.

Now, the company the city contracted to oversee Orion’s design and construction and to run the venue, The Venue Group, stylized as tvg, plans to build a new 2,500 to 3,000 capacity venue in Huntsville. Orion’s capacity is 8,000.

According to a tvg press release sent by the City of Huntsville, tvg are currently “are identifying locations for a new mid-sized venue.”

In a statement, tvg managing partner Ben Lovett, also a musician with Grammy-winning folk-pop band Mumford & Sons, says, “Our partnership with Huntsville began with The Orion, a project that transformed the city’s cultural identity and gained national recognition. Huntsville’s commitment to its music ecosystem is unlike any other, and we’re thrilled to now explore another world class venue that will further cement its place as a cultural hub.”

Huntsville mayor Tommy Battle added, in a statement, ““The Orion has become a source of pride for Huntsville. We’re excited to take the next step in strengthening our city’s cultural infrastructure by working with tvg to explore a new tvg venue that will open even more opportunities for artists, audiences and the wider community.”

This week, Orion is celebrating its 100th performance with two concerts by Mumford & Sons with alt-country singer/songwriter Margo Price as opening act.

When plans were announced to build a world class amphitheater in Huntsville on par with iconic storied venues like the Hollywood Bowl and Colorado’s Red Rocks the idea was met with some skepticism. Huntsville was just a tertiary market for concert tours. The city was known for aerospace engineering. Music? Not so much.

But since Orion Amphitheater opened in Huntsville in spring 2022, naysayers have continually been proven wrong. With a classic coliseum-inspired design and contemporary updates, Orion put Huntsville on the map musically. Media outlets like Rolling Stone took notice.

In 2024, Orion was nominated for Outdoor Concert Venue of the Year in live music trade publication Pollstar’s annual awards. Other nominees for the award, named for Red Rocks Amphitheatre, included the aforementioned Hollywood Bowl.

The Venue Group’s planned mid-sized venue would be the venture’s third Huntsville project. This spring, tvg opened phase one of its long gestating reboot of beloved eclectic downtown venue The Lumberyard.

At the time, Lovett told AL.com, “A lot of the work has gone into kind of re-establishing the soul and the identity of what makes the Lumberyard such a unique space.”

Orion opened spring 2022 with an Alabama-centric weekend of concerts featuring the likes of Jason Isbell, Emmylou Harris, Waxahatchee, Brittany Howard and Drive-By Truckers. Notable 2025 Orion bookings include Lil’ Wayne, blink-182, Willie Nelson, and Billy Strings.

An announced Sept. 4 Orion show by country star and “American Idol” judge Luke Bryan marked the first artist (so far) to schedule shows at Orion and Birmingham’s new Coca-Cola Amphitheater in the same season.

In its debut season this year, Coca-Cola Amphitheater has booked an impressive array of artists. Those include: Pantera, Alabama Shakes, Def Leppard, Alabama Shakes, Rod Stewart, Phish and Jessie Murph, challenging Orion’s status as Alabama’s go-to amphitheater for top tours. Coca Cola Amphitheater is run by Live Nation, the kingpin of the U.S. touring industry.

According to tvg press release, since opening, Orion Amphitheater has welcomed around 626,000 attendees. According to that release, in its first three years Orion generated more than $45 million in revenue and led to $131 million in total economic output for the Huntsville area, including “direct, indirect, and induced impacts.”

The press release also states 48 percent of Orion tickets were sold to non-local visitors, a boon for local hotels, restaurants, retail, etc. The Venue Group also says Orion is on track to break into Pollstar’s Top 10 Worldwide Amphitheaters by ticket sales in 2025, up from its number 33 ranking in 2023.