CAN SMALL FESTIVALS SURVIVE THE MUSICAL WASTELAND OF SUMMER 2020?
“We have lost an entire year’s income but not a year’s worth of costs”
It’s that time of year when, were the world its usual state, most music-lovers in the UK would be dusting off their camping gear, donning a bucket hat, and pulling on their wellies ready to brave another season of the weird and wonderful delights offered by Britain’s music festivals.
Festivals have increasingly become a cornerstone of the grassroots music scene in the UK, vital incubators of talent where new bands can get noticed and old bands can reach new ears.
It was a sad, sad day for music when Glastonbury was forced to cancel this year’s festival back in March. Clearly a five-day gathering of 200,000 people, many of whom would be in various states of substance-induced tactility, was out of the question given the global pandemic.
But there was hope - Glasto ticket-holders were content with their guaranteed places at next year’s festival, meanwhile many smaller festivals hadn’t yet offered feasibility statements of their own - an abundance of promising alternatives still seemed to be on the cards.
But as spring turned into summer, the infection rate soared, and lockdown persisted, reality hit home as, one by one, our small British festivals began to cancel.
Most offered messages of hope and solidarity, expressing their sorrow for this year’s loss while simultaneously promising to come back bigger and better than ever in 2021 and generally guaranteeing automatic places at next year’s festival for ticket-holders.
But there is uncertainty behind the brave facades. VOCAL GIRLS spoke to some of the organisers of Britain’s small music festivals, whose outlook ranged from cautious optimism, to outright anger, and in some cases, grim hopelessness.
“We might have to be a little more creative and thoughtful, making the most of our resources whilst planning for the future.” - Deborah Shilling, Black Deer Co-Founder
Black Deer festival is an Americana and Country music festival in Kent. Deborah Shilling, festival Co-Founder, said their top priority when they knew they would have to postpone was that they invite their artists - including The Waterboys, Imelda May and Jade Bird - to still perform in 2021 when, she said, they’d be back: “absolutely, lock, stock and ten smoking barrels.”
Image Credit: James Kay - Black Deer Festival 2019
She stressed that the cancellations will have a knock-on effect not just on the artists and festival organisers, but on the entire festival community, including agents, festival suppliers, and vendors reliant on their seasonal income.
Shilling said the response from the Black Deer community has been incredible, with the vast majority of ticket-holders retaining their tickets for next year, and that the organisers are ready to adapt moving forward: “We have to choose where it is important to spend, and where we might have to be a little more creative and thoughtful, making the most of our resources whilst planning for the future,” she said, adding, “we love everything about the festival world and hope that the industry will see this through as a whole.”
“It’s going to wreck us.” - Rupert Morrison, Creative Director at Sea Change festival
For Sea Change festival, an alternative music and arts festival curated by the award-winning Drift Record shop in Devon, the outlook is much more bleak.
“It’s going to wreck us,” said Rupert Morrison, Creative Director of the festival. “Four years of growth just totally wiped out.” He added, “I think the truth is we just don't know what the future looks like yet, but with amazing professionals and venues going out of business like Wildfire it sure does feel grim right now.”
Morrison conceded that cancellations have been the only safe and logical option, but he is angry with the Government, whom he blames for being too slow and vague in informing organisers. He thinks emerging artists will be hit hardest by the consequences; “You only have to look at the government arts package to see the shocking lack of trickle down,” he said, adding “nowhere to play, no support to do it. I am just fuming about the whole situation to be honest.”
Morrison asks, “where does the next wave of new large venue fillers come from?” He worries that, without recognition of how important grassroots music is, the entire live music system could implode catastrophically within a few years.
He said Sea Change is focusing on trying to deliver something impactful, adaptive and safe, but that they don’t yet know how that will look. He expressed doubt that any festival would look the same over the next few years. “There are some AMAZING events that will return, adapt and be as brilliant and inspiring as they were before, but they will not look or feel the same and we need to move past that” he said, adding more hopefully, “The future is there for imaginative thought and bright ideas.”
“We have lost an entire year’s income but not a year’s worth of costs.” - Pete Noz, Managing Director of Nozstock
‘Imaginative thought’ is what Pete Noz, Managing Director of boutique Herefordshire music festival Nozstock, is applying to try to supplement their losses. “We have lost an entire year’s income but not a year’s worth of costs,” he said. Nozstock are launching an online shop to try to replace some of their lost income, and hope to host some small one-day events or Glamping experiences on the farm later in the season.
Noz hopes the festival will be back to its old self by 2021, and questions how organisers will deal with the obvious priority of safety, especially if social distancing is still in place. He expects at least some things will have to be done differently, referring to suggestions by some festivals that audience-members’ temperatures could be taken as they arrive.
“Music is all about shared experiences, communicating and celebrating.” - Juliet Russell , Creative Director of Also Festival
Juliet Russell is a founding Creative Director of Also festival in the Midlands. Like many cancelled festivals, Also hosted an alternative digital experience in May, to keep their audience connected. “Technology has been pivotal in the changes we’ve made” said Russell, “as has having a community around what we do.” Excitingly, Russell said they have just had the go-ahead from the council to run Also Social - a much smaller, physically distanced festival experience - on the postponed date of 28-30 August.
She said cancellations across not just festivals but the whole live performance scene is having a major impact on independent and up-and-coming artists. “Many artists make a lot of financial sacrifices just to be able to make music” she said, adding that “it’s not just the income… connecting with your audience, building your audience, getting your music out there - the whole joy of performing live. Music is all about shared experiences, communicating and celebrating.”
Offering a glimmer of hope, Russell can see potential for the future, an opportunity to work differently, innovatively and creatively to get the music industry back on its feet: “Only time will tell,” she said, “it’s only 4 months after the initial lockdown and we’re all very much still in the process of discovery, learning and re-inventing.”
Well, fingers crossed - as they say, ‘necessity is the mother of invention’, but if swaying half-cut and sunburnt through a sweaty mosh of beer-sloshing millennials in an arse-end-of-nowhere muddy wet field isn’t a true necessity of British music culture, then I don’t know what is.