Selecting Seats at Venues

[progman1975]

With me living in central PA, some of my prog shows end up being at the Keswick Theater. What I really detest is that they pick your seats for you unlike
other venues where you can pick the exact seat or seats available. Any other venues do this???

[Man In The Mountain]

I agree. It's kind of a strange thing because I bought tickets to see Ben Folds at the Chicago Theater earlier this year, and I got to chose my seats off the seating chart. Now ARW are playing the SAME theater and now they pick seats for you. Very aggravating, especially because my wife & I like to buy box seats.

[JKL2000]

Hmm, I bought tickets for Marillion this fall at the Keswick (never been there before!), and I got the front, Left orchestra section, 7th row, in the center of that section.
Somehow I'm thinking I picked those, not an automated system, but I could be wrong. Agree that's annoying if it's the case. Some venues let you do it either yourself or automated.

Do those seem like good seats for the venue?

[JKL2000]

Hey, speaking of the Keswick, I'm planning to spend the weekend in Philly with my family to do the touristy thing (when not at the Marillion show), so I was wondering if anyone had a hotel recommendation in the historical area.
And also, how long is the drive to the Keswick and how much do you think an Uber car would cost?

TIA

[gpeccary]

A LOT of venues seem to do this, frustrating as hell! THEY say the best seats available, but are they? I miss the good old days

[WHORG]

There's a theater in town that sells tickets one row at a time - filling each row completely before starting another row.

I open multiple browsers (Safari, Chrome and Firefox) - and use a second computer (PC) if necessary. I login to the ticketing program (on each browser) and reserve (up to) 10 seats at a time - until the seats I want are in the middle of the next row. The system "holds" the previously held seats for like 5 minutes before they're released . . . and I'll sometimes reserve up to 20 to 40 seats like this across multiple browsers until I find the tickets I actually want - then purchase those before the previous multiple sessions expire. I need to be quick though . . .

I've always sat pretty much where I want with this particular method, but understand that some systems might not allow this, venue, etc . . .

[SteveSly]

With me living in central PA, some of my prog shows end up being at the Keswick Theater. What I really detest is that they pick your seats for you unlike
other venues where you can pick the exact seat or seats available. Any other venues do this???

It is the same around here. Some venues now feature seat maps where you can pick your own and others don’t. Sometimes it can vary from show to show which I always find strange. For example, at our local hockey arena I saw Umprhey’s McGee a few months ago where you could pick your individual seats. I am going to the same venue to see Alice Cooper this weekend and you had to choose best available (unless you went to the actual box office). I have no clue why this is though.