On the evening of Dec. 8, 1985, a set of local bands convened in the Springfield Art Museum’s auditorium in front of over 200 audience members to celebrate the life and music of John Lennon.   

“Nobody was working on Sunday, Dec. 8, so that’s how we got people together to put the program on,” said Ron Butler, founder of the Imagine concert.   

Five years earlier, Lennon, 40, had been shot and killed outside his New York City apartment. His death shocked millions of fans around the world, especially as he had released a new single,  

“(Just Like) Starting Over,” a mere two months before his death.   

Butler, a musician, began Imagine as a way to turn his community’s heartbreak into a positive celebration of Lennon’s impact on them both musically and personally.   

“I was of the age, in 1964, when the Beatles played on The Ed Sullivan Show,” Butler said.  

“Everybody I know my age, musician or not, were excited about the Beatles.”  

Butler wanted Imagine to be not only a tribute to Lennon, but also a way to honor his advocacy for peace. Imagine became an annual fundraiser for local charities and nonprofits, raising around $1,000 to $3,000 each year. Selected organizations included the AIDS Project of the Ozarks, Boys & Girls Club of Springfield and Women in Need of the Ozarks.   

“Nobody lines up to get a check for this,” Butler said. “It’s always volunteered, and everybody learns songs.”   

In the early years of the concert, Butler contacted Yoko Ono, Lennon’s widow. According to a Springfield News-Leader article, Ono sent well wishes to Butler and donated over $45,000 to the concert from the late 1980s into the early 2000s.

After 18 years of planning the annual event, Butler needed a break, and the concert was put on hold in 2003. Matt Netzer, owner of Dugout Bar & Grill, took over as the managing director and revived the concert in 2009. 

“This isn’t work for me,” Netzer said. “Everyone has a very singular goal here, and it takes a village. It’s cool, it’s just a great thing to be a part of.”  

Before 2009, Imagine struggled to find a venue each year. As a fundraiser, production costs were left up to its producers. Netzer, whose business at the time was downtown at The Outland, reached out to the historic Gillioz Theatre as a potential venue for the concert.   

“I said, ‘Why don’t we just make sure it’s here to be able to come to, and let’s make it a Gillioz fundraiser,” said Geoff Steele, Executive Director of the Gillioz.   

The Gillioz is a nonprofit organization that relies on donations and sponsorships. After a 26-year closure, subsequent bankruptcy in 2008, and the negative impact of COVID-19 on the music industry, Imagine helps the theater remain an integral part of Springfield’s history. The concert is now an annual fundraiser for the theater, raising over $20,000 in 2022 through sponsorships, ticket sales and merchandise.   

Netzer says the concert has become an annual tradition for Springfield to celebrate its local musical talent. “This is a music town, and there’s no end of support for these performers,” he said.   

On December 2, 2023, at 7:30 p.m., the annual concert commenced. It was full of love, music, and community as the bands sang on stage and the audience sang along with them.   

Kristi Merideth, lead singer of the band 83 Skidoo, said, “It’s fun because you’re doing what you love, but it’s totally different when you’re looking out into the Gillioz, and there’s this room full of people singing the words and dancing. It’s just an amazing night.”   

Bands such as 83 Skidoo, Big Beat Club, Distant Relative, Maximum Weekend, Molly Healey, Papa Green Shoes and Red Light Runner played their renditions of popular John Lennon and Beatles songs.   

Each band has their own signature of the popular songs everyone knows and loves. They took the songs and turned them into jazz songs, rock songs, and even through the lens of a violin.   

Molly Healey, a successful local musician, said, “It’s a wonderful night for good feelings and seeing some really talented musicians playing some really great songs.”   

There were many people who had been going to Imagine since they were young and now brought their children and their children’s children. From the stage, you saw band members calling out names in the crowd, of people they have seen come to the show for years and years prior. “But it’s very gratifying.” Butler says. “I’ve seen the same people in the crowd that I’ve seen since 1985.”  

The audience members only spoke with fondness as they talked about their experiences in the years prior to the Imagine concert. Some of them talked about individual members and others talked about the years before the concert was held at the Gillioz.      

The same people were also dancing, singing, and celebrating the music of a band that shaped history as local bands played their hearts out and celebrated as well.

At the end, all the bands came together on stage and sang John Lennon’s Imagine. There was no previous practice session, but they all took turns singing while hugging and laughing with one another. You saw the love and appreciation they had for each other, and it was the only time all of them would be on the stage together in such a profound way.   

What started in 1985 to pay tribute to the loss of a phenomenal musician had become an annual celebration of local talent as they perform music to both John Lennon and The Beatles.   

For those who wish to attend the concert in the future, it is always held at the beginning of every December. For more information, go to the The Gillioz Theatre website.

Article written by Maddy Bohman and Madison Stahl

Photos by Maddy Bohman