[Article] Festivals are dead! Glastonbury organiser Michael Eavis claims boom in summer music events will be over in three years

[Jenjie]

The future of the music festival is in peril, according to the founder of Glastonbury.
Michael Eavis, who started Britain's biggest event on his Somerset farm in 1970, says the market place is crowded and cheaper gigs abroad pull crowds - with the same acts at a fraction of the price.

Mr Eavis also blamed the economy, in particular a lack of jobs for young people and high tuition fees for lacklustre ticket sales.

Eavis, who has an estimated fortune of £42 million, told The Times: 'It's on the way out. We've probably got another three or four years.
'Womad and Latitude are not selling out. Partly it's economics, but there is a feeling that that people have seen it all before.
Speaking about his own festival, he said: 'We sell out only because we get huge headliners. In the year Jay-Z played we nearly went bankrupt.'
The cost of a ticket to this year's Glastonbury was £200 and headline acts included Beyonce, U2, Coldplay, Morrissey and The Chemical Brothers.

When tickets for this year's festival went on sale last October, they sold out within two hours.

T in the Park which takes place at Balado in Kinross-shire this weekend sold out within an hour.

Some 85,000 music lovers will descend on the three-day event in Scotland, where Beyonce and Coldplay will also headline.

However Latitude Festival, which takes place next weekend in Southwold, Suffolk, still has almost 1,000 tickets left for a line-up which includes KT Tunstall, Bright Eyes and Suede.

It has been suggested that there are around 40 per cent of the tickets left for both Reading and Leeds Festivals. Tickets for both cost £192.50.

British music festivals face stiff competition from those across Europe.

For Benicassim, a festival held on the beach in Barcelona with a line-up including Arcade Fire, Arctic Monkeys and Elbow next weekend, tickets are £165 - and the sunshine comes almost guaranteed.

Glastonbury started in 1970 - a day after the death of Jimi Hendrix.

Some 1,500 festival-goers were charged a pound and the ticket price included milk from Eavis's Worthy Farm.
Last year, Glastonbury celebrated its 40th birthday with Eavis taking to the Pyramid Stage on the final night with Stevie Wonder to sing the chorus of his hit Happy Birthday.

At this year's Glastonbury 135,000 tickets were sold. Next year the event will take a break to allow the site a 'fallow' year and return in 2013.

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[mc_squared]

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Originally Posted by Jenjie;4869885
In the year Jay-Z played we nearly went bankrupt.'

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No surprise there. I said at the time it was a bad move to have him as a headline act at what is generally considered to be a ROCK festival.
I'm not saying he didn't go down well at the time, just that it's not really what people expect or crave as a main stage headliner at Glasto.

[Black Rose]

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Quote:

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T in the Park which takes place at Balado in Kinross-shire this weekend sold out within an hour.

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And tickets appeared on the secondary ticket selling sites on the same day

[mc_squared]

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Jenjie;4869885


However Latitude Festival, which takes place next weekend in Southwold, Suffolk, still has almost 1,000 tickets left for a line-up which includes KT Tunstall, Bright Eyes and Suede.

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No surprise there, either. All credible acts, but hardly "big-name headliners".