Stratton Tingle, executive director of SoundCorps, stands at his standing desk in the Arts Building on 11th Street in downtown Chattanooga.Stratton Tingle
Age: 33Relationship: SingleEducation: Bachelor’s degree in film productionHobbies: Music
You can thank Stratton Tingle if you've noticed - and enjoyed - seeing more musicians than ever play on downtown Chattanooga's streets.
Tingle is the executive director (and only full-time employee) of SoundCorps, a nonprofit Chattanooga organization that pays roughly 50 performers $25 each time they "busk," or play music for two hours, at spots with high foot traffic, including on Frazier Avenue, at the Tennessee Aquarium and near the Walnut Street pedestrian bridge.
Called "Sidewalk Stages," the program that launched in April subsidizes performers - who still get tips - and brings more live music to Chattanooga's streets.
"Our mission is to build Chattanooga's music community," says Tingle. "Our goal is to reach 250,000 people with live, local music."
On any given weekend, 15 to 25 performers are working as hundreds of pedestrians pass by.
SoundCorps - which gets its funding from foundations, not tax dollars - will spend $40,000 annually on its Sidewalk Stages program. Along with performers, the program pays for a manager and "busker bosses" who check on the buskers and take photos of live performances to share on social media.
Bob Doak, president and CEO of the Chattanooga Visitors and Convention Bureau, calls Sidewalk Stages "an exciting, new way to animate our streets, weaving the diverse sounds of our city throughout public space."
Tingle has been in bands since his early teens. He first moved to the Chattanooga area in 2001 to study at Southern Adventist University in Collegedale. Tingle graduated in 2006 with a degree in film production, a major he chose because he wanted to learn how to make music videos. He loves Chattanooga so much that he's stuck around, with a resume that includes a six-year stint at the Chattanooga Chamber of Commerce, where he ended up as an account executive.
Tingle has long, flowing dreadlocks - partly in reaction to having to shave his head every year as a state champion swimmer at high school in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. It was as a college undergraduate, during a humanitarian aid trip in 2002-2003 to Zambia, that Tingle first grew the hair that he admits helped "brand" him as he walked and biked around downtown, where he moved in 2007.
"For a long time, people knew me as the white guy with a suit and dreadlocks downtown," he says.