The Festival Rush

This was the third edition of the Escape Festival and going by the current on-again,off-again status of most music festivals which are announced in India,that makes it quite a success. For the past couple of years,many festivals have been publicised,which either don’t make it past their maiden year or do not take off at all. An infamous case in point would be the Ladakh Confluence,which had to be called off last year after local protests,much to the chagrin of many who had already booked their transport to Ladakh and bought the tickets for the festival. Other festivals which failed to take off,include the Ujaan Festival in the Sunderbans and the Tamara Confluence in Coorg.

Sahil Makhija,lead vocalist of Mumbai-based band Demonic Resurrection,is of the opinion that alternative music festivals don’t work in India for the simple reason that Indians don’t like to pay for such music. “There’s this mindset that we can just download all this music,so why pay for tickets,” he says. Even sponsors are difficult to come by. “Take the case of Independence Rock,which was once the premiere rock festival in the country. Now,it is having a hard time staying afloat.” The problem is quite unique because it is the growing number of such alternative festivals and concerts that has ironically played spoilsport. “Sponsors don’t know where to put their money,” he shrugs.

According to Bobby Talwar,co-founder of music management company Only Much Louder,the problem is more complex. “It’s not really enough to just get the funding or to have pockets deep enough to sustain a festival. You need to get everything right: the programming,the stages,the equipment,the vibe.” In fact,Talwar says that getting the licences and permissions isn’t a problem,as long as one follows the procedures. However,it’s the planning that makes or breaks the festival. “The Ladakh festival had to be cancelled due to poor planning,” he states,“If they had cleared everything with the locals,it would have worked out.”

In fact,it’s important to get local support for a proposed festival,right from the planning stages,all the way to execution. “When we were organising the Big Chill Festival in Goa in 2007,we involved the locals throughout. When an event on such a scale is organised in a place,the local people naturally have to have a stake in it,” Talwar says. Nayan seconds Talwar and cites the active involvement of the local population as one of the reasons that the Escape Festival went off well.

Jishnu Dasgupta,bassist for folk-rock act Swarathma,asserts that organisers need to make their intentions clear right from the outset. “There are two kinds of festivals that happen in India: the out-and-out commercial festivals at venues like the Palace Grounds in Bangalore. Then there are the festivals with an agenda of environmentalism or sustainability. These are the ones that tend to flounder,because it’s not easy to combine that agenda with the realities of a music festival. The organisers need to be really honest with themselves about why they’re doing this and how they’ll make it work. It can’t just be a big party with lots of noise and trash.”

The musician is unsure about how soon such a concept can really catch on in India. Unlike in Europe or the US,where camping for the weekend at a music festival is a legitimate recreation,the idea is new to India,especially when combined with a green agenda. “Something like the UK’s Glastonbury Festival is extremely well-organised,where the tickets sell out within hours and you won’t have unexpected hordes turning up. It makes management much easier,and it’s also simpler to enforce the ‘leave no trace’ rule,where people don’t leave a trail of rubbish behind once the festival is over.”