Sharon Jones getting venue named after her in South Carolina

The late, great Sharon Jones is getting a new music venue named after her. The city council of North Augusta, South Carolina -- across the Savannah River from Jones' birthplace of Augusta, GA -- unanimously voted Monday night to rename the Riverside Village Amphitheater to the Sharon Jones Amphitheater. The venue only opened in June, having hosted a few socially distanced shows during the pandemic.

Though Sharon moved to New York City when she was three, she still spent a lot of time in Augusta. “She would be flabbergasted right now," Jones’ sister Willia Stringer told Rolling Stone. “We didn’t live far from there. My father used to walk down with us down to the river. Back then, there was nothing there but trees and the river.”

"This is so cool,” Gabe Roth, owner of Daptone Records, whose first release was Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings' debut album, told RS. “No one was able to lift the room like she could. It’s great to have a place where people will hit the stage and think of her. She would have been thrilled."

Sharon died in November of 2016 after a battle with cancer.