It’s no secret that Australia’s music festivals are in crisis. In the past twelve months, major festivals, including Splendour in the Grass, Groovin’ The Moo, and Falls Festival have either folded or gone on hiatus. There are several reasons why these all-day (or all weekend) parties, which were once a summertime staple, are dropping like flies.
The first is that live music has struggled to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns – about a third of Australia’s live music venues have closed since then. The live music scene is so dire that the Commonwealth government is holding an inquiry into what’s gone wrong.
A major survey of music festival organisers released earlier this year found that the most significant barrier to running a music festival is rising operational costs (fuel and electricity etc for lights, sounds, transport etc).
And then there is the impact of climate change – the increasing incidence of extreme weather has made hosting events harder and substantially increased the insurance costs.