After more than 130 years in the community since its creation, the Friday Musicale located in downtown Jacksonville continues to be a popular wedding venue destination for couples looking for furnished auditoriums, grand foyers and an exciting piece of history.
In 1890, as an attempt to make friends that shared her same musical passion, Claudia L’Engle Adams began gathering friends in the parlor of her home on East Monroe Street. After three years of weekly meetings, a formal club was created in 1893 through a series of elections, with Mrs. Adams as its first president.
The present-day location of the Friday Musicale was not purchased until 1929, at 645 Oak Street, where it currently remains home to the Friday Musicale organization.
Today, the Musicale remains a heavily community based and non-profit organization. They host a number of events including corporate, charity, recitals and weddings. Since they are a nonprofit, all money raised through rentals of the two buildings goes towards music education for kids in the area.
Weddings at the Friday Musicale have always been lively and exciting. With two options for venues, eager couples can choose between The Auditorium, a furnished 1930’s Colonial Revival style auditorium that accommodate 250 guests in theater-style seating, or The L’Engle Hall, a furnished hall that accommodates 90 guests seated at tables with a dance floor and 150 guests in theater-style seating.
Jeff Tawney, the venue rentals manager at Friday Musicale, said that the halls closed down for about 7 weeks at the start of the pandemic, but opened again once the stay-at-home order was lifted. Now, the Musicale is open again and operating on a nearly-full basis, with multiple weddings and events booked for almost every weekend through the end of summer.
“We follow CDC guidelines, and local and state guidelines, as well, in terms of capacity,” said Tawney.
In terms of larger wedding gatherings, Tawney said that guests have been fairly self-sufficient about capacity when it comes to their own events and enforcing the Duval County mask mandate.
“A lot of people who host events are doing their due diligence to scale back all on their own,” said Tawney. “It is amazing to see the way people have just taken it upon themselves to make sure that their event is going to be safe.”
Tawney also said the Musicale is seeing lots of interest in brides looking to get their weddings up and running again. The 2021-2022 wedding season is sure to be a busy one, with many people finally believing to see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.
On Saturday, Sept. 25, the Musicale will be hosting a “Wedding Fair,” where excited brides-to-be can see for themselves the thrill of a wedding inside the historic halls.
