Festivals: The boutique boomers
WEATHER WITH YOU?
Portmeirion, home to Festival No. 6: “There is no other festival site like this in Britain”
Smith readily comprehends the underlying shift “in favour of the boutique festival as the smaller events are offering something unique and far more intimate. When you’ve only got 1,000 people at a festival you really feel a sense of community and belonging, which I think has been lost at festivals like V and Leeds.” Part of an understandable
vogue for single-day events, ITW chimes with a bespoke
line-up including The Pogues, Roots Manuva and Emmy the Great.
ECLECTIC/ELECTRIC With a capacity of 35,000, Latitude could never be described as a small festival. But in its championing of a more adventurous roster that reaches far beyond the borders of the rock/pop/dance template, it is arguably the forerunner of the current vogue for boutique
“When you’ve only got 1,000 people at a festival you really feel a sense of community and belonging...”
Tim Adam-Smith, In The Woods
trend that also includes several festivals conceived as one-offs, including Strummer of Love, a Somerset gathering devised to mark the 10th anniversary of Clash mainman Joe Strummer’s tragically premature passing. “The economy may be in a
state, but it’s a festival’s job to ease these worries of the world and get people together to enjoy themselves,” says festival booker Jay McAllister, who emphasises the charity-aiding motivation of a three-day event sporting a
30 l PSNLIVE 2012
eclecticism alongside Secret Garden Party and the Big Chill (the latter itself acquired by Festival Republic in 2009). “I wanted to rewrite the rule book of what a festival could be, and to create something for an older age group than that which was going to Reading/Leeds,” explains Benn of an event which burst into life in 2006 with headliners including Patti Smith and Mogwai. Latitude has flourished as its scope has expanded, and the 2012 line-up
SSE Audio Group director Yan Stile highlights another factor in the rise of the smaller festival – a widespread perception that (until this year at least!), British summer weather has improved of late. “The result is that people feel more confident putting on events. There are also a lot of acts that wish to do multiple festivals, and so this kind of [event density] does make sense,” he says. Cheltenham Jazz and the brand
new No Direction – which brought acts including Richard Hawley, Gruff Rhys and Veronica Falls to Nottinghamshire’s Welbeck Estate in early June – are among SSE’s more bespoke festival commitments. “There is often a slightly looser
is perhaps the most varied yet, running the gamut from Bon Iver and Elbow to Jack Dee, pianist Lang Lang and a group from the National Theatre. But delivering acts to suit a
wide variety of tastes isn’t necessarily a guarantee of success as an event’s appeal will also partly depend on a more intangible connection between format and festival-goer. Benn readily concedes the point with regard to the Big Chill, news of whose 2012 cancellation broke back in January. “Sometimes a festival just loses its way, and that’s what happened with Big Chill,” he says, while stressing that the event will return in a
revamped format for 2013. With a further rupture in the
eurozone appearing increasingly likely at the time of writing, the extent to which the Big Chill will return to a more hospitable climate is, frankly, anyone’s guess. But if commercially the glory days are, for now, behind us, this year’s new events suggest that festival organisers are eyeing a fresh creative peak. The beer-sozzled, hands-in-the-air, 50,000 people in a field experience will probably always have its place, but it now has the vital counterweight of an altogether more cerebral roster of events ready to engage head, heart and feet. PSNLIVE 2012
atmosphere to new events that’s appealing,” observes Stile, adding that the general procedure with a debuting festival is to “talk to the organiser early on, get a feel for how it’s going, get some CAD drawings done... It’s not rocket science.” Meyer Sound systems were
integral to SSE’s No Direction spec, but there can be no set formula for smaller events: “It’s really about what everyone’s happy with, and used to.” Stile is at pains not to appear
bullish about the overall economic landscape (“I’ve got plenty of friends who are out of work now”), but does confirm that SSE is enjoying a “very good summer – busier than last year”.
www.prosoundnewseurope.com
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