Ring In 2023 In Bradenton: Main Street Live, New Year Nationals

BRADENTON, FL — Manatee County residents and visitors alike will find plenty of fun parties and events to say goodbye to 2022 and welcome 2023 on Saturday night.

This includes Main Street Live, which returned to downtown Bradenton this fall with monthly block parties. Now, the event series celebrates New Year’s Eve with a night of festivities.

This free party features music from Seranation and Trevor Bystrom Band, as well as a countdown to midnight and fireworks show. Food trucks and other vendors will set up during the celebration.

Here is a look at some additional events happening in Manatee County:

• New Year Nationals, Bradenton Motorsports Park, 21000 S.R. 64, Bradenton. Four days of drag racing (Dec. 29 – Jan. 1) includes fireworks Saturday to ring in the new year.
• New Year’s Eve Party, Mattison’s Riverwalk Grille, 101 Riverfront Blvd., Bradenton
• Paisley Craze NYE Party, Trailer Estates, Bradenton
• New Year’s Eve Party, 88 Live Piano Bar, 6640 Cortez Road, Bradenton
• New Year’s with Ray Fuller and the Blues Rockers, Cottonmouth Southern Soul Kitchen, 1114 12th Street, Bradenton

In the United States, one of the most popular New Year’s Eve traditions is, of course, the dropping of the giant ball in New York City’s Times Square. Various cities have adopted their own iterations of the event — the Peach Drop in Atlanta, the Chick Drop in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and the giant Potato Drop in Boise, Idaho.

The end of one year and beginning of another is often celebrated with the singing of “Auld Lang Syne,” a Scottish folk song whose title roughly translates to “days gone by,” according to Encyclopedia Britannica and History.com.

The history of New Year’s resolutions dates back 8,000 years to ancient Babylonians, who would make promises to return borrowed objects and pay outstanding debts at the beginning of the new year, in mid-March when they planted their crops.