Festivals ‘in the thick of a real crisis’, says Music Australia chief

Australia’s music festivals are “in the thick of a real crisis” as young people turn their backs on events in alarming numbers, the head of government agency Music Australia said when launching a landmark survey of the sector on Tuesday afternoon.

Soundcheck, the first large-scale survey of the music festival industry in Australia, was commissioned by the federal government’s peak arts body, Creative Australia, and the sub-body Music Australia, and captured the state of the sector in the financial year 2022-23. Among its more alarming findings is the scale of the drop-off in attendance by young people.

In 2018-19, people aged 18 to 24 made up 41 per cent of festival audiences, by far the largest cohort of attendees. But in 2022-23, they constituted just 27 per cent. Over the same period, attendees in the 25-29 age bracket rose from 23 per cent to 35 per cent, suggesting an ageing audience and serious issues attracting the fresh blood the sector needs to guarantee its renewal and sustainability.

“When we look at rising costs, extreme climate, insurance premiums, regulation, difficulties with headliners, currency fluctuations, there are multiple, complex issues,” Music Australia chief Millie Millgate said as she launched the findings.

“Would it be different if we had one or two of those in isolation? Or are we really at a breaking point because they are just compounding ... we’re looking into this really seriously.”

The report provides the most comprehensive overview of a sector that has in recent times seemed to lurch from crisis to crisis, with postponements and cancellations due to poor ticket sales, bushfires, floods, extreme heat and difficulty securing headline acts and venues.

Significantly, it does not cover the period since July 1, 2023, a nine-month stretch that has seen a number of large events – including Splendour in the Grass and Groovin the Moo – cancelled, meaning the true state of affairs right now could be even worse than the report suggests.

“Until now, the size, scale and impact of the industry has not been well documented or understood,” said Creative Australia’s head of strategic development, Georgie McClean. “We hope this report will serve as a useful tool for festival organisers and help us to better understand the role and contribution of festivals within the broader creative industries as they face multiple challenges.”

According to Soundcheck, Australia is home to 535 music festivals (defined as festivals primarily focused on music, thus excluding multi-arts festivals in which music is just one component), with a combined revenue of $234 million in 2022.

The report claims the average cost of running a festival is $3.9 million, though that figure is drawn from a sample of 51 festivals, including some of the biggest, which “may not be representative of the broader festival industry”, the report acknowledges.

More than half of festivals (56 per cent) reported a profit in 2022-23, with the median profit being $731,579.

The largest genre was electronic music, which accounted for 23 per cent of the festival sector. Rock (21 per cent), country (19 per cent) and indie music (17 per cent) were also dominant genres (a single festival could encompass multiple genres).

The report does not factor in all the smaller festivals and bush doofs that take place across Australia, many of which have managed to withstand the body blow affecting the industry due to their niche audience and lower costs.

Drawing upon data collected in the National Arts Participation Survey, released last September, Soundcheck reports that festival attendees are going to fewer music events generally than they were prior to the pandemic.

“Compared to 2019, music festival goers are attending nearly three fewer music events per year (10.5 music events in 2022, down from 14.2 in 2019),” the Soundcheck authors noted.

The most significant drop was among 25 to 39-year-olds (down from 16.7 music events in 2019 to 11.9 in 2022) and 18–24-year-olds (down from 14.1 events per year in 2019 to 11 in 2022).

“One potential explanation for this drop is the impact of rising attendance costs for music events combined with the increasing cost of living in Australia,” the authors said. “Contemporary music festivals had the highest average ticket price of all arts events in 2021, and many come with additional costs for patrons such as travel and accommodation,” they added.

“The cost of tickets remains the most common barrier to attendance, impacting more than half of Australians (55 per cent).”

According to Soundcheck, “half of the music festivals held in Australia are located in regional or rural areas”, and such events “can hold a significant economic and cultural value for the local area and play an important role in regional development”.

It is, however, regional events that are most at risk from environmental factors (heavy rainfall and flooding, fire, heat and drought) and cost-of-living pressures (by virtue of being multi-day events with add-on costs for travel and accommodation).

Events like CMC Rocks (this one was in Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley in March 2013) bring significant economic benefits to the regions, but are increasingly at risk from environmental factors.Credit: Destination NSW

“Climate extremes are having a serious impact on music festivals,” the report notes. “In the summer of 2021-22, over a dozen music festivals across the country were postponed or cancelled due to record floods … the previous summer festival season in 2019-20 was also impacted by large-scale weather events. Coinciding with the devastating Black Summer fires, festivals such as Falls and Day on the Green in Victoria and Lost Paradise in New South Wales were cancelled due to threats from fire or dangerous smoke.”

The possibility of cancellation, one promoter interviewed by the authors said, meant it was becoming increasingly difficult to attract headline acts from overseas to come to Australia for an outdoor festival.

“When you’re negotiating with your talent ... because it’s so remote … they feel there’s a lot of risk in coming to Australia,” the promoter said.

Another significant factor that has emerged is the Music Festivals Act in NSW, developed following a spate of deaths at festivals in 2019. The law imposes strict requirements on festival organisers – in some cases, including that each underage ticket holder must be accompanied by an adult – that can inflate costs associated with increased police and security staff, and deter attendance by younger people.

“It’s the total aversion to any level of risk,” one festival organiser said of the approach. “It feels like New South Wales Police see [festivals] as a coronial inquiry waiting to happen.”

More than a quarter (27 per cent) of festivals reported that navigating policy and/or security requirements was having a “moderate to severe” impact on their event.

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