Tucson Music Hall — Attraction in Tucson

February 2024. The staff at every interaction were rude and inconsiderate, even mean and unnecessarily so. My wife was dropped off by an Uber near the Music Hall. The parking attendant was rude to the Uber driver who was just trying to understand where to go to drop someone off. My wife got to the Hall before me and she was told she could not go in the lobby because she had a small (opaque) purse almost a clutch. You are only allowed to bring clear, see-thru bags, apparently. They do not offer a 'purse check' to their customers. They tell them they must go put the purse in the car. But many people take cabs and Ubers to the Hall. What are they supposed to do? This really stupid thing can ruin a couple's entire evening. And for what? Have we fallen so far as a society that a woman cannot bring her purse to the opera or ballet? We saw one elderly woman who took a cab to the event and had to leave because she had nowhere to put her purse. So, she wasted a $165 ticket, the cab fare, and her evening. If this were run like a real business with owners that cared about customers, this self-imposed problem would have been ameliorated immediately. This kind of situation is stressful for people, and the staff working the event, for the most part, did not care. It was a cold night, and my wife asked if she could wait for me in the lobby to collect her purse and put it in the car when I arrived. The attendant said to my wife, "I need you to leave now." I guess because her purse was so dangerous and offensive. Eventually, I found my wife, got her purse and had to walk it all the way to the parking garage and put it in the car. I barely made it back in time to enter and get seated before they stopped allowing people to be seated. The attendants were rude again to me and my wife. We rushed to our seats, and as we were headed in, an attendant made my wife throw away her wine -- which they had just sold her because wine is not allowed in the seating area -- only the lobby. But they did not tell her this when she was buying the wine only minutes before the doors to the seating area were about to close - and where no wine is allowed. I saw many people turned away with purses and several men like me running purses back to the parking garages. This is a very unpleasant customer experience. This kind of behavior is typical of large venues, and it is sad that we put up with this kind of treatment. I will never go back to the Tucson Music Hall - now called The Linda Ronstadt Music Hall. And I wonder if Linda knows how poorly patrons are treated at this hall named after her. I will tell everyone I know about our terrible experience at the Music Hall and the very poor treatment by many of the staff. Please join me in not attending events at the Music Hall until they begin to treat customers with dignity...

Super crowded, if you’re not the size of an 8 year old girl you will be sitting on top of the person next to you. Your knees will be touching the chair in front so if someone in the middle needs to get up during the show, half the row will need to exit entirely to accommodate which is really annoying. Sat in upper balcony, tonight to see The Nutcracker at 7pm and a dude was seated after the show already began in front of us, really annoying bc I kept hearing the usher asking where his seat was at and eventually half the row had to stand up, blocking our view so this man could sit down. I personally think if you can’t bother to show up before the show starts you should have to wait till intermission to be seated out of courtesy to the other people who were responsible enough to arrive early.

Also, the concession lady who was working drinks tonight was really rude, I waited in line behind TWO people for fifteen minutes prior to the show starting to see about getting a drink, she was busy gabbing away with them. When it was time for me to order, before I could even say what I wanted, she interrupts “I just made this hot chai, it was a wrong order for the couple in front of you, would you like it?” I was kinda happy because it’s not everyday you get offered a free drink! “For free? Sure!” I said as I reached my hand out, she laughed and loudly said “for free?! You wish huh.” Like how rude is that? How are you going to interrupt me mid order to offer me a drink you messed up on as if it was a free item, and then loudly jest at my question? She could’ve said “I accidentally made this, are you interested in buying a hot chai?” Not “do you want this”. She ended up being out of the syrup I wanted too, kind of glad so I didn’t have to buy an $8 small drink.

My final complaint is the fact that there was no option to have an older kid/adult audience present. Children are a blessing but it’s really annoying hearing babies scream their heads off during a 2 hour long ballet that I paid good money for, late in the evening. There should be an option for at least one showing to be childfree, they can be a huge distraction.

Not worth it. Too many downsides I couldn’t even...

Since we're from the Phoenix area, so far, all our experiences there have been for the Mariachi Festival.

The theater is set somewhat back and you have to walk past the sports arena to get there... But it's a nice walk and they have ample ramps for ADA patrons to use if need be.

The theater itself is older, but quite accommodating. They have staggered stairs if you use the hallway to get to your seat, which is my preferred method, or you can go inside into the theater proper, and use the ramps to get to your seat. Just be aware that the ramps are on the steep side.

The seats are comfortable and accommodating, unlike a lot of venues of today which put as many seats as they can into the venue, leaving very little comfort at all.

Next, is something I'm fairly sure was done on purpose. You have plenty of leg space to stretch out and be comfortable, and people can get past you on the way to their seats without bothering you which is nice for a change.

But that added comfort is actually a trade off....each row must have about sixty seats or so, and are accessible from either end, but there's no middle isle...so everyone has to transverse across people to get to their seats...but in actuality, it works out fairly well.

As a curiosity, I asked several people and several ushers, the following question: If you had your choice, would you rather have less leg room and a middle isle, or keep the status quo?

The answer was a resounding 100% ...have a middle isle. At the time, I totally agreed with them, but now, on further reflection, I'm on the fence about the answer.

I heard there's talk about renovations coming in the future, and probably a middle isle would be one of the considerations, still, all in all, the status quo might not be so bad in the long run....only time will tell.

So, If you find yourselves in Tucson for an event at the TCC, the Linda Ronstadt Music Hall, is a very nice place to be ...

There seems to be ample parking, and the parking garage is the one most utilized... it's $10 for parking but it's a walk to the venue, especially for ADA persons, but still doable.... but certainly shouldn't be a deterrent...