Meet the woman picking bands for OTW's Left Bank Stage

By Christopher Hosken

Rockford, IL – We continue our On The Waterfront series this morning (Thursday) with a chat WNIJ's Christopher Hosken recently had with Karen Howard. The 64-year-old has chosen which musical acts you enjoy at The Left Bank Stage for more than two-decades. Besides picking an eclectic line-up with many genres folk, blues, jazz, and others Howard is also in-charge of negotiating contracts and paying performers, a sometimes nerve-racking task. In terms of the criteria she uses to make her picks, she says near the top of the list is whether an act is passing through the area at the right time.