Whenever a line up for a music festival is announced there will always be thousands of people who are listening, keen to hear what bands are going to be making headlines at the latest music festival. But what differentiates between a ‘good’ music festival and a ‘great’ music festival? Why do some festivals sell out in 10 minutes flat and others need to still be selling tickets at the door? And on a wider scope, why do some festivals start out popular but as the years go by, get smaller and smaller.
The festival season is still a while away, but already thousands of Australian music lovers are getting keen for another massive festival season. But the biggest problem festival organisers face is that people are starting to question whether they are getting value for their money. New festivals are popping up every month with the overall attendance rate climbing by 87.5%.
This now means that festival goers can be a lot pickier about what festival they choose to go to. How are organisers combating the smaller attendance rates?? By putting the ticket prices up. This can be seen by looking at Big Day Outs ticket prices – when they started off in 1992 tickets cost $40 yet they still had a huge lineup with some massive names. By 2004 they were still sitting pretty low at $86 but by last year ticket prices sky rocketed to $175.
20 years of the Big Day Out
Moshtix has recently released a report called the state of music festivals report.
It is easy to see the price rise hasn't gone unnoticed – 83.7 per cent of respondents think that the steep cost of music festivals is the key reason attendance numbers at music festivals have declined. Big Day out is a classic example. Big Day Out has always been a music festival that has sold out. But as shown in the figures below this year’s ticket sales have almost halved from the figures of the year before.
BIG DAY OUT ATTENDANCE NUMBERS
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Auckland
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2012
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20000
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2011
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40000
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Gold
Coast
|
2012
|
40000
|
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2011
|
50000
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SOLD OUT
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Sydney
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2012
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47000
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2011
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55000
+
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SOLD OUT
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Melbourne
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2012
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42000
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2011
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52000
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SOLD OUT
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Adelaide
|
2012
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12000
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2011
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30000+
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||
Perth
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2012
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12000
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2011
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35000
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Another thing promoters seem to be doing wrong is that they are trying to please too many people with too wide an array of music. It doesn’t work having bands that play heavy metal music at the same music festival that a rapper is playing at. Or organizing a techno festival and having One Direction headlining.
People don’t mind paying top dollar if they like majority of the music being played but when they have one or two bands they enjoy and the rest is completely different taste of music, people would prefer not to waste their money so they decide just not to go. $175 to wait around all day to see one headlining act doesn’t seem feasible. Festivals need to downsize, and they need to appeal to a similar audience.
The point of music festivals should be to bring a group of people, with similar tastes in music, together for an event that they will all equally enjoy. Take the FRL (Folk Rhythm and Life) Festival held in Victoria every December. It last for 3 days and only cost $150. Kids under 14 are free. So already they are appealing to a certain kind of group (families).
Festival Of Folk, Rhythm and Life
The emphasis is on local Australian talent, which is again different to some other music festivals. And it is a “volunteer’s festival”. None of the crew or volunteers gets paid. The profits are donated to various organisations. Lastly what makes it different from other festivals is the property the FRL festival is held on (Bilyana) can only hold about 2000 people, so the festival stays small and intimate. A festival like this will have a much bigger chance of still being held in 20 years’ time then what a music festival such as Summerdayze will be. People are simply there to relax, have a great time and listen to music.
You will find at a lot of main stream music festivals there a lot more people are there to be seen and to be ‘cool’(think six packs and no shirts or spray tans) rather than being there because they enjoy the music. Add into that drinking, drugs and violence and you can start to understand why alot of the festival goers from yesteryear refuse to pay big dollars to attend the shows now. Crowd behavior is worsening and starting to get out of control.
Some music festivals fare better
than others due to the timing of the event.
Look at the Byron Bay Blues and Roots Music Festival. It is held for 5 days over the Easter break
so it makes it a lot easier for people to have the time off to attend. It is also an all age’s event which makes it
easier for parents to go to because they don’t need to find babysitters and can
make it into a family holiday.
This is reflected by the steady continuous rise of ticket sales. In its first year ticket sales were sold out with 6000 tickets being sold over 4 days. In 2012 the ‘bluesfest’ drew in crowds of over 20 000 people a day. Even though ticket prices are high ($139 per day or a cheaper rate of $455 for 5 days) there are so many other factors that make it fit into people’s lives, and they don’t mind paying it.
Promoters need to find a balance between a high quality line up, the ticket price and making sure the crowd behaves the way it should be. The lineup/music acts are by far still the key in whether or not someone will attend a music festival. And that, in a nutshell, is exactly what it comes down to. If you're going to put on a festival, the main purpose should be the enjoyment of the music. If promoters can see the outside ‘bigger’ picture then they are much more likely to create a music festival that is going to succeed and still rocking in years to come.
References
(2012) 20 Years Of The Big Day Out available www.tonedeaf.com.au/slideshows/119506/20-20-years-of-the-big-day-out.htm#21 last accessed 28 April 2012
(2012) Festival news available www.musicfestivalsaustralia.com last accessed 23 April 2012
(2012) List of Australian Music Festivals available http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Australian_music_festivals Last accessed 29 April 2012
Jack T (2012) Big Day Out figures down in official stats available http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Australian_music_festivals Last accessed 29 April 2012
(2011)Moshtix reveals satet of festival market report available http://specialevents.com.au/2011/09/moshtix-reveals-state-of-festival-market-report/#.T6Y0eNVacmJ Last accessed 30 April 2012
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