Kevin Drew plays with his band Broken Social Scene during Field Trip music festival at Historical Fork York on June 3, 2017.Glenn Lowson/The Globe and Mail
There was a time when Canada was flush with new music festivals. Two of them, Field Trip and the Toronto Urban Roots Fest (TURF), took place at historic Fort York Garrison Common in downtown Toronto. Neither multigenre event lasted long.
Years from now, archeologists digging at Fort York might find muskets, cannonballs and Feist’s backstage pass.
There are multiple reasons why those festivals (and others) failed. Certainly, the lack of deep pockets to ride out the growing pains of a new event was an issue. A more artistic problem was their eclectic programming. Trying to please too many people with too many genres, the festivals had no identity.
A lot of music today is consumed through streaming-service playlists that are tightly focused and stylistically homogenous. Curated by algorithms, the playlists are personalized. Which is at odds with festivals that value diversity in their programming.
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For music fans raised on playlists, an artist lineup for a genre-unfocused festival is a menu in a foreign language. They can pick out some artists, but the rest is a mystery. Tickets aren’t cheap − consumers want to know what is being served.
“People tell me, ‘I don’t know anyone on the festival poster any more,’” said concert promoter Elliott Lefko.
Lefko, who cut his teeth in Toronto, is vice-president of AEG Concerts. He recently attended the Cruel World Festival in Pasadena, Calif., with a lineup tightly focused on 1980s new wave, postpunk and gothic rock. Mainstage acts this year included New Order, Devo, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Garbage and a reunited ‘Til Tuesday.
The music resonated with fans of a certain age with certain tastes. For them, it was one-stop nostalgia shopping for the moody sounds of their youth. For promoters and music fans alike, focused programming is a safer bet than mixed-genre bills populated with lesser-known artists.
“There are people who do want to discover new acts and have their own tastes, but I just don’t think it translates in a big enough way to do a festival,” Lefko said. “If you’re not a super music aficionado, targeted festivals make more sense.”
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An example of a focused event in Canada is Republic Live’s All Your Friends Fest, now in its second year at Burl’s Creek Event Grounds in Oro-Medonte, Ont. Similar to Live Nation Entertainment’s When We Were Young festival in Las Vegas, it specializes in emo and pop-punk.
The festival titles are an indication of a targeted demographic: music friends of a certain age. All Your Friends headliners this year are aughts heroes Avril Lavigne, Simple Plan and Rise Against.
Republic Live is the Canadian company behind another genre-specific event, the thriving Boots and Hearts country music festival.
“We’re very focused on building brands,” says Brooke Dunford, director of booking and brand strategy for Republic Live. “We’ve seen a lot of success where we’re able to create an identity with a community of like-minded fans.”
The company had less success with its defunct WayHome Music and Arts, a multigenre, multiday camping occasion at Burl’s Creek, which lasted just three years, 2015 to 2017.
The market for genre-unfocused events tends to be inconsistent. To establish the brand loyalty commanded by Coachella, for example, initial costs can be prohibitive.
Not that there aren’t healthy multigenre festivals in Canada. Two of the biggest are Montreal’s Osheaga Music and Arts Festival and Ottawa Bluesfest. Mark Monahan, Bluesfest founder and executive director, isn’t convinced genre purity is necessary. Despite the festival’s title, blues is just a part of the annual event of rock, pop and roots music.
“To my mind, it’s less about genre than it is choosing the right artist,” said Monahan, who also is the director of Ottawa’s CityFolk, known for its diverse lineups.
People listen to the sound check prior to the start of the Vancouver Folk Music Festival at Jericho Beach in Vancouver, B.C., on July 13, 2017.Jimmy Jeong/The Globe and Mail
Canada’s biggest folk festivals, including Winnipeg Folk Festival (founded in 1974) and Edmonton Folk Music Festival (since 1980), are not considered multigenre. But they do have an elastic definition of what constitutes folk music, and they do not trade on nostalgia.
“I book up to 60 per cent new artists each year,” said Edmonton Folk artistic director Terry Wickham. “There’s just so much good music out there.”
Edmonton Folk, Winnipeg Folk and others are built on a model of using local volunteers and fostering a sense of camaraderie and multigenerational loyalty. Audiences trust the artistic direction, marking the event on next year’s calendar before the artist lineups are even announced.
Still, the model isn’t infallible. The money-losing Vancouver Island MusicFest and Regina Folk Festival both shut down this year. The Vancouver Folk Music Festival has struggled in recent years, as has the Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival.
Live music is a tight-margin venture, and artist fees are skyrocketing. Where festivals used to be the industry’s big payers, it is nearly impossible for them to compete now with arena and amphitheatre tours.
“With dynamic pricing, artists can make so much money on the road,” Wickham said. “I won’t name names, but one artist we had in 2019 wants eight times more money now.”
One festival director in favour of human curation is Virginia Clark. Her long-running Wolfe Island Music Festival went on hiatus after 2019 but is now back. The boutique event, a ferry ride away from Kingston, is beloved as much for its indie-rock fellowship as its broad-ranging sounds.
“We’ve never aim to create a lineup that mirrors a playlist,” Clark said. “We curate with intention, context and a sense of place.”
Among the artists booked for the two-day event (Aug. 8-9) are Born Ruffians, Land of Talk and Chloë Doucet.
“We’re not here to reflect the algorithm,” Clark said. “We’re here to push against it.”
