Positive Vibration – the UK Festival Award-winning celebration of reggae music and Jamaican heritage – will return to Liverpool’s Baltic Triangle in June for a weekend of music, art, food, and cultural appreciation. Insights spoke with Rory Taylor – founder of Positive Vibration – about the festival’s development over the past few years, the unique characteristics of its home city, the challenges of appealing to a specific audience, and more. Festival Insights: Positive Vibration launched in 2016 and was crowned Best New Festival at the UK Festival Awards that year. How has the festival developed since? Rory Taylor: We actually…
Author: Festival Insights
UK: Skiddle, the UK’s biggest event guide & ticketing outlet, has announced that it will be partnering with Safe Gigs For Women, working together to combat sexual harassment and assault at live music events. The partnership – announced on International Women’s Day – will see Skiddle championing and supporting Safe Gigs For Women, aiming to reduce the number of cases of sexual harassment at gigs, club nights and music festivals by taking part in a series of campaigns, awareness raising events and fundraising activities. Whilst Safe Gigs For Women is established in its work with gig-goers, venues, and artists such…
UK: Midas’ generators powered London Marathon Events’ Vitality Big Festival in Greenwich Park on March 4, across the finish line from the inaugural Big Half marathon. Eleven thousand amateur runners, many from host boroughs Tower Hamlets, Southwark, Lewisham and Greenwich, followed the elite athletes’ race along the 13.1m route from Tower Bridge, the majority joining friends, family and supporters at the festival afterwards. Event management specialist Relevent commissioned six Midas sets for the contract, providing for stage production, the sponsors’ area, including a New Balance shop and a fitness centre, a run of street stalls and the production village. James…
UK: A Greener Festival has revealed the latest recipients of its Greener Festival Awards and Greener Events Awards. The Greener Festival Awards, a scheme led by A Greener Festival, have operated since 2007, and in that time have assessed over 400 festivals worldwide and assisted them with resource efficiency, decreasing their waste and carbon emissions, and ameliorating the impact that events and festivals have on the environment. Since the launch of TGEA last year, the team has already worked with a wide range of events from conferences to multi-venue shows, from AGMs to sports events. Since A Greener Festival’s last…
FRANCE: Airstar has released a new range of bulb shaped lighting balloons for the live events industry, simply dubbed ‘Bulbs’. The inspiration behind Bulbs came from Pierre Chabert, President and Director of Innovation at Airstar. The Bulbs are named after great inventors and are inspired by vintage bulb shapes appreciated by both the general public and the Airstar network. “The event market constantly needs to renew itself to provide new ideas and solutions for its customers and the general public,” explained Airstar sales director, Xavier Ponson. “Traditional light bulbs are popular shapes that you can find in most design stores…
NETHERLANDS: Eurosonic Noorderslag has announced that its next edition will shine a spotlight on the emerging music scenes of both Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Working in close cooperation with Pohoda Festival CEO Michal Kaščák and Márton Náray, Director of Sound Czech / Czech Music Office, this represents ESNS’ first ever dual-country focus. ESNS booker Robert Meijerink commented: “We are keen to showcase the unique, high-quality music from these two neighbours. Although two of the youngest countries in Europe, they both have diverse and growing music scenes, a great history and lots of amazing music to be discovered.” Coordinator of…
UK: The multi award-winning festival Kendal Calling has sold out for the 13th consecutive year, less than three weeks after announcing its first wave of acts for 2018. Ticket-holders will see Catfish & the Bottlemen, The Libertines and Run DMC perform at the Lake District this summer, which last year became a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Also set to appear over the weekend are Hacienda Classical, James, Ocean Colour Scene, Shed Seven, The Sherlocks, White Lies, The Wailers, Declan McKenna, Fun Lovin’ Criminals, Lucy Spraggan, Slow Readers Club, The Amazons, Peter Hook & The Light, Tom Grennan, The Lancashire Hotpots,…
CHINA: The Mr. Future Music Festival brought nearly 40,000 fans to Wuhan, China to enjoy an array of hip-hop and electronic artists last November. Sharing the massive stage with acts like MC Hotdog, known as the ‘godfather’ of Chinese hip-hop, Dutch DJ R3hab, and Canadian EDM duo DVBBS, were over 100 Adamson loudspeakers supplied and supported by the company’s exclusive Chinese distributor, Real Music. Tickets for Mr. Future sold out almost immediately, meaning the stakes were high in delivering a memorable experience for the hyped-up crowd that filled the venue to capacity. “Mr. Future is a very unique and innovative…
DENMARK: American activist Chelsea Manning will give an exclusive talk about rights and personal engagement at Roskilde Festival. It will be her first European speaking appearance since the commutation of her sentence in 2017. The talk constitutes part of the festival’s Equality programme, which has run for the past three years, and is designed to inspire festival-goers to take a stand and broaden their mind. Chelsea Manning – then known as Bradley Manning – was sentenced to 35 years in prison in 2013 after leaking classified documents related to the United States’ war efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. One of…
UK: Magners Irish Cider has secured an exclusive slot as Global’s cider partner for 11 of its music festivals across the UK this summer. Magners aims to enhance festivalgoers’ experiences with ticket promotions, special offers, and social & digital activations. At selected festivals, including Y Not Festival and the three Rewind festivals, Magners will also deliver a bespoke Magners Cider Garden. Additionally, the partnership includes London’s iconic Printworks venue, which opened for its third season on March 3, and will see a dedicated Magners Dark Fruit Bar at the venue. Magners Original and new Magners Dark Fruit will be available…