Noodle Con, billed as “The Thinker’s Convention,” is a two-day event that’s part music festival, part lecture series.
Its lineup is expected to include live performances from musicians Chance the Rapper, CeeLo Green and Aloe Blacc and keynote speeches by Newport News Mayor Philip Jones, musicians and tech professionals.
Last week, Jones said he learned the event was missing nearly three dozen permits, including ones for parking, security and public safety. He called a special meeting with city council members to resolve his concerns.
“With all the events and things that have happened in Virginia Beach, public safety is top of mind for me,” he told WHRO.
He said the event is still on track for May 22-23 at Victory Landing Park.
Newport News City Council approved a $3 million grant in 2025 for the Port Warwick Foundation to put on the event — before any performers were confirmed. Patriotic Festival president Ira Agricola told WAVY that, as far as he knew, $3 million is "the largest sponsorship any municipality has given to a festival.”
The money from the city came with conditions, including meeting deadlines for ticket sales.
A group called Audit Newport News questioned the legitimacy of the event earlier this month, including how the money from the city was disbursed and spent and who was in charge of controlling the event value.
Stephanie Sutton with Global Music Touring, the company promoting the event, couldn’t give WHRO an exact number, but wrote in an email that “thousands of GA tickets and several hundred VIP tickets have been secured.”
General admission tickets started at $125 dollars, but organizers announced last week they’re now free. The free tickets were depleted shortly after, leaving only VIP tickets priced at $240.
Sutton said people who bought general admission tickets before they were free would be reimbursed. She said the decision to reduce ticket prices was deliberate.
“We made this free to ensure equity and accessibility, given the caliber of guests and material that will be presented,” she wrote in an email.
Organizers also reduced the capacity of the event from between 30,000 to 40,000 people to 8,000, The Daily Press reported last week.
Despite these changes to tickets and event scale, the city told WHRO the foundation met the conditions and was awarded the full $3 million.
Jones said he’s glad Global Music Touring made tickets free to make the event more accessible.
“Newport News needs to compete in the tourism space,” he said. “We are falling behind our peers, and we need to have something that attracts people to our waterfronts and have access to our waterways.”
Jones said one goal of the event is to attract tourism. Another is to position Newport News as an innovation hub.
“We have a lot of different assets, whether it's Liebherr, the Newport News shipyard, Jefferson laboratory, the secure energy future center,” he said. “We have all these things, and we need to find a way to put them together.”
He said he wants Noodle to showcase the city’s potential for AI and tech.
