Full vaccination required for Womadelaide’s 30th anniversary return to Botanic Park

Womad has become the first major event to reveal its Covid vaccine policy – and the strict rules planned for those allowed in to Adelaide’s biggest music festival this coming March.

World music festival Womadelaide is the state’s first major event to announce it will require full Covid vaccination when it returns to Botanic Park for its 30th anniversary in March.

Everyone over the age of 16, from audiences to artists, staff and management, will need to have received two vaccine doses to purchase tickets or be admitted on site.

After a scaled-down series of four seated concerts was moved to King Rodney Park earlier this year, Womadelaide will return to its usual seven-stage format from March 11-14 at Botanic Park, where it has been held since 1992.

The event’s director, Ian Scobie, said that its 2022 program would once again feature mostly Australian artists, who will be announced at a later date, but that it had also approached a small number of overseas acts.

“We’ve got about four invitations pending with international artists. It’s a call we will make soon,” Mr Scobie said.

“My feeling is we will probably have it 90 per cent, if not 100 per cent, Australian sourced.”

Womadelaide in 2019. Picture: Matt Loxton

Artist contracts would need to be finalised in the next few weeks, and there was still uncertainty about international flights and quarantine restrictions, Mr Scobie said.

Womadelaide often shares international artists with other interstate or overseas festivals in the region, which are faced with similar restrictions.

Capacity in Botanic Park will be limited to 18,000 people at one time, instead of the usual 25,000, but Mr Scobie said the event rarely approached those numbers during any individual day or night session.

“Even in 2020, I think our peak got to about 13,000 or 14,000, so it’s still a fairly dispersed crowd,” he said.

Audience members will need to check into Botanic Park with a QR code, and scan another QR code each time they enter busier areas near the front of different stages, which will have waist-high perimeter barriers with multiple entry points supervised by staff.

“That will provide SA Health with that degree of comfort, in terms of contact tracing,” Mr Scobie said.

“We’ve had a couple of meetings with SA Health over the last couple of months and reiterated that our plans to go back in Botanic Park are all on track.

Associate festival director Annette Tripodi and festival director Ian Scobie. Picture: Roy VanDerVegt

“All the audience and the artists will be fully vaccinated – absolutely everyone, whether it’s stallholders or crew.”

The Adelaide Festival and Fringe said they would wait to follow the State Government and SA Health mandates on vaccination requirements.

Womadelaide was first held as part of the 1992 Adelaide Festival, when Australasian band Crowded House was the headline act.

That New Zealand based band recently reformed with a new line-up which includes singer-songwriter Neil Finn’s sons Liam and Elroy, and released its first album in 11 years, Dreamers Are Waiting.

Mr Scobie would not confirm whether there were plans for Crowded House to return for the 30th anniversary.

“Ah, you’ll just have to wait and see,” Mr Scobie laughed.

Tickets will go on sale with the first line-up announcement in November.

Pre-sale registrations at womadelaide.com.au