DANA POINT : Wedding Bells Nix Planned Blues Festival

Wedding bells have canceled the return of blues music to Heritage Park this year.

A previously booked wedding bumped the Orange County Blues Festival from the park this weekend. Organizer Jim Oakes recently confirmed that the blues show will be rescheduled for sometime next summer.

“We ran out of time,” said Oakes. “We were at the point of no return, and there was no time to get a new date.”

Oakes tentatively set July 14 and 15, 1995, as the new dates for the festival. However, he is also considering holding the festival in August.

He will be go before the Planning Commission on Oct. 5 to seek approval of a use permit for Heritage Park.

Oakes had applied last spring for a permit to hold the festival, asking for the weekend of Sept. 24 and 25. Several weeks after the application was filed, city officials discovered that a wedding had already been booked at Heritage Park on Sept. 24.

In late July, Oakes was told by city officials that the wedding had priority. He has since decided to delay the festival for a year.

Rescheduling the show for later this year was complicated by a competing blues event, also known as the Orange County Blues Festival, which will take place Oct. 1 at Doheny State Beach.

Oakes and organizers of the Doheny State Beach show ran last year’s blues festival in Heritage Park. The partners split acrimoniously, accusing each other of financial misappropriation.

Cross-complaints have been filed in court for the rights to the name “Orange County Blues Festival.” Both cases are pending.