Red Rocks Amphitheatre

레드록스 원형극장

Red Rocks Amphitheatre is an open-air concert theatre near Morrison, Colorado, about ten miles southwest of Denver. The city of Denver owns and runs it. The seating area holds 9,525 people and sits between two giant red sandstone rocks, Ship Rock and Creation Rock, with a smaller Stage Rock nearby. The rocks form the theatre naturally.

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At a glance

Country: United States
Location: Near Denver, USA
Built: 1941
Type: Theatre

Quick answers

Where is Red Rocks Amphitheatre?

Red Rocks Amphitheatre is in Near Denver, USA, United States.

When was Red Rocks Amphitheatre built?

Red Rocks Amphitheatre was built in 1941.

An open-air venue with natural acoustics, set between two towering red sandstone monoliths.

It is known mostly for concerts and music festivals, but other events are held there all year. In 1957 the American Institute of Architects picked it as Colorado's entry at an exhibition in the National Gallery of Art. In 1999, after Pollstar magazine had named it the best small outdoor venue for the eleventh time, the magazine renamed the award the Red Rocks Award and took Red Rocks out of the running.

How the rocks were made

The red rocks around the theatre are part of the Fountain Formation and formed millions of years ago. They were then lifted and tilted during a mountain-building event called the Laramide Orogeny, which also created nearby places such as the Garden of the Gods and the Flatirons. Their reddish colour comes from oxidized minerals, in other words, rust-like iron. The Ute people probably used the area before an Army expedition under Stephen Long found it again in 1820.

From garden to theatre

The site was first called the Garden of the Angels. In 1906 the magazine editor John Brisben Walker bought it, renamed it the Garden of the Titans, built a temporary stage and also a funicular railway up Mount Morrison. In 1927 Denver bought the area for 54,133 dollars. With architect Burnham Hoyt and workers from the Civilian Conservation Corps and the Works Progress Administration, building of the amphitheater began in 1936. It was dedicated on June 15, 1941, with a performance by the singer Helen Jepson.

Famous nights

The opera singer Mary Garden put Red Rocks on the world map in 1911 by saying she had never found a place with better sound. The Beatles played there on August 26, 1964, the only show on their US tour that was not sold out, and Ringo Starr later recalled that the air was so thin they were given oxygen. Bruce Springsteen played his first outdoor concert there in 1978, and U2 filmed a concert in heavy rain in 1983. After a 1971 Jethro Tull show ended in a clash with fans without tickets, rock concerts were banned for five years. A new stage roof was built in 2020-2021.