An open letter by the two organizations calls for the music and event industries to take safety matters into their own hands:

“…venues, festivals, studios and workplaces are too often not safe spaces for women, girls and marginalized genders.

It is high time we change that, and we have a collective responsibility to take action. This restart needs to be for all of us. Our spaces must provide safety from harassment, violence, and abuse of power. Music should be a place of joy and inclusion for all.

Let’s make 2021 the year the music and events industries rise up to the call of the #MeToo movement – and commit to change.”

The letter proceeds to name several disquieting statistics, including that 40% of women under 40 have been sexually harassed at a live music event. Up to 95% of victims don’t report it. Workplace culture in particular is to blame for lack of reporting by women in the music industry, argues the letter.

At time of writing, Strawberries & Creem has yet to outline how it will answer this call. It has, however, fulfilled a prior commitment to book 50% women on the bill.

Glastonbury, ticketing platform DICE and multiple high profile musicians have also signed onto the initiative.

Safe Spaces Now launched in March. It has since presented politicians with 150 ideas on making the U.K. a safer place for women. Various thought leaders, grassroots organizations, software engineers and students have participated in the campaign.

No official reasons have been given for the cancellation. Speculation is that the ongoing indecision regarding the reopening of nightlife and large scale events in the U.K. have affected Equinox. Houghton Festival has also pulled the plug on its 2021 iteration for the very same reason.

“We’ve decided not to go ahead with the September gig idea for a number of reasons, so we’re putting all of our energy into the campsite for now,” Glastonbury Festival organizer Emily Eavis said in a statement. She revealed that the family-friendly Worthy Pastures festival grounds would continue to operate as normal in lieu of Equinox.

U.K. festivals and the nightlife sector have cited multiple issues with obtaining insurance permits, along with the effectiveness of the country’s track and trace system, and a lack of clarity around the official U.K. reopening timeline as reasons for recent cancellations. The Association of Independent Festivals (AIF) has recently suggested that over half of the U.K.’s summer 2021 festivals have been cancelled or postponed due to the threat of COVID-19 and the ever-changing safety measures surrounding it.

After the COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of 2020’s Glastonbury event, the Eavises submitted a plan for 2021 to the local council in Mendip District, where the festival takes place at Worthy Farm every year. While a normal capacity typically allows 200,000 people to attend the festival, Glastonbury is seeking permission for up to 50,000 to attend this year’s festivities in accordance with new safety guidelines instituted by the U.K. government in light of the pandemic.

This year’s iteration of Glastonbury would see the festival only hosting one stage, the iconic Pyramid Stage, and none of the overnight camping facilities typically provided. The organizers have also made it clear that all safety measures surrounding COVID-19 would be put in place in accordance with the current pandemic regulations.

No official dates have been announced, though Michael and Emily Eavis are hopeful for a September event. The licensure request was submitted in March, and the Mendip District council will meet Wednesday, May 12th to discuss further planning.

Glastonbury joins over 2,700 cultural organizations in receiving over £400 million in grants, including Boomtown Fair Festival, Brixton Disco, Noisily, Highest Point, Camden Roundhouse, and many others. The grants serve as a part of the U.K. government’s £1.57 billion culture recovery fund.

“We’re extremely grateful to be offered a significant award from the Culture Recovery Fund,” said Glastonbury organizers Michael and Emily Eavis in a statement. “After losing millions from the cancellation of our last two festivals, this grant will make a huge difference in helping to secure our future.”

As with many other festivals and live music events, the 2020 and 2021 iterations of Glastonbury were cancelled as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Glastonbury organizers planned a five-hour live stream event in lieu of the festival as a means of raising funds for the losses suffered. That live stream event is slated to take place in May.

To learn more, visit Glastonbury Festival’s official website.

 

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A post shared by Emily Eavis (@emily_eavis)

As detailed in her post, one of the applications is for September at their longtime home of Worthy Farm. The second event is for an undisclosed date in the summer at the same location. Due to the licensing process, Eavis has stated that the results of their application will likely take a few months.

When announcing the pair of prospective events, Eavis mentioned that the latter of the two is “not for partying.” While details of what she means remain unclear, the September outing has been described as a concert.

The next chapter of Glastonbury is scheduled to take place June 22nd-26th, 2022 at Worthy Farm in Somerset, England. More information on the event can be found on the event website.

After denying that the festival had been cancelled in early January, co-organizers Emily Eavis and her father, Michael Eavis have now officially confirmed the news that the 2021 installment of Glastonbury cannot take place. “In spite of our efforts to move Heaven and Earth, it has become clear we simply will not be able to make the festival happen this year,” they said in a joint statement. “We are so sorry to let you down.”

With great regret, we must announce that this year’s Glastonbury Festival will not take place, and that this will be another enforced fallow year for us. Tickets for this year will roll over to next year. Full statement below and on our website. Michael & Emily pic.twitter.com/SlNdwA2tHd

— Glastonbury Festival (@glastonbury) January 21, 2021

As did many other major festivals worldwide, Glastonbury held a virtual stand-in festival as a replacement for its flagship event in 2020. Would-be attendees who had made a £50 deposit down on tickets for Glastonbury 2020 were allowed to roll that deposit over to be put toward this year’s festivities, but now that roll-over will need to be extended for one more year.

“As with last year, we would like to offer all those who secured a ticket in October 2019 the opportunity to roll their £50 deposit over to next year, and guarantee the chance to buy a ticket for Glastonbury 2022,” the co-organizers said. “We are very appreciative of the faith and trust placed in us by those of you with deposits, and we are very confident we can deliver something really special for us all in 2022.”

Glastonbury has been one of the leading forces calling for government aid in underwriting insurance that would allow U.K. festivals to resume in 2021, after British MPs had warned that many festivals wouldn’t be able to continue on without it in December. Since then, the U.K. has shifted back into a lockdown state in an attempt to curb the rising infection rate.

For more information, visit Glastonbury’s official website.

The World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus a pandemic in early March, triggering a festival crash as new health restrictions were imposed. Between rapid testing and newly approved vaccines the 2021 season shows more promise – but in case further complications arise, MPs have said that “there will be no festival season next year” without proper coverage. Insurance companies are leery of underwriting events after paying out staggering sums in 2020, however.

“In a usual planning cycle we would already be well into organizing the next festival,” said Emily Eavis, the daughter and co-organizer of Glastonbury Founder Michael Eavis. “The best solution would be for the government to offer direct financial support in the event of Glastonbury, and other events, being forced to cancel once they’re well into the preparations.”

She continued: “If the government can share the risk by offering direct financial support, then it gives everyone the opportunity to move forward with the planning in the hope that things will be safe to run in the summer, and in the knowledge that backing is available if we’re simply not in a position to go ahead.”

Eavis had previously shared a hopeful outlook for the 2021 festival, tweeting that “we’re still very much aiming for June.” Only a month prior, though, her father had called it “wishful thinking” to expect that the event would move forward as planned.

“We know these are challenging times for the live events sector and are working flat out to support it,” wrote the Department for Digital Media, Culture and Sport in a statement. “We have invested £1 billion so far through the culture recovery fund to protect tens of thousands of creative jobs… with £400 million more support still to come.”

135,000 Glastonbury Festival attendee ticket deposits have rolled over from the canceled 2020 event. The festival’s organizers have yet to formally announce the 2021 edition at the time of writing.

“The UK is the leader in the world in terms of music and arts festivals. The sector is worth £12 billion and supports many thousands of highly-skilled jobs as well as the financial lifeblood of the nation’s musicians,” said Julian Knight, the Conservative chairman of the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee. “However, there will be no festival season next year unless insurance is underwritten in case of COVID-19 disruption.”

“Festivals are such a vibrant and integral part of our creative community and our economy, and I am well aware that many will take decisions very soon about whether they can go ahead next year, so this is a very urgent situation,” replied Culture minister Caroline Dinenage.

With plans to get this insurance in place with a lead time of six months before any U.K. festivals take place, the House Of Commons is working to secure the necessary insurance that will allow festivals to proceed. Dinenage insists that a base of evidence demonstrating that insurance coverage is the only barrier for 2021 festivals must be built first, however.

Image Credit: Anna Barclay

In a quote transcribed by DJ Mag, Challis discussed plans for construction on the festival grounds to maintain the scale of the event. He also went on to mention organizers’ intentions of retaining the lineup from the postponed 2020 showing, which was set to feature performances from Fatboy Slim, Thom Yorke, Eats Everything, Patrick Topping, and others.

“For 2021 we will have to start building in March, or the end of March because it’s a big festival and it takes a lot to build, and no one wants to do a ‘light Glastonbury,'” Challis said. “The plan would be to rebook the 2020 bill; it will move everything, including our 50th-anniversary celebration to 2021.”

Continued Optimism

Many are hopeful to roam the Glastonbury festival grounds in 2021 following organizers’ comments on the event over the past few months.

In September, co-organizer Emily Eavis shared that they had no plans to delay the festival. This, of course, is more assuring than founder Michael Eavis‘ remarks in August which labeled the next iteration of the festival as “wishful thinking.” While the messages are mixed, many are grasping on to the fact that it has not been outright canceled.

At the time of writing, the official Glastonbury website does not list any information for the 2021 outing. The most recent posts to the news section of the site are related to merchandise and the virtual festival experience held in place of the real-life party.

“For those who have been asking, we have no plans to move next year’s Glastonbury to September 2021 – we’re still very much aiming for June,” Emily Eavis tweeted. She went on to say that so few would-be attendees had asked for refunds that ticket resale would be pushed back from October, 2020 to April, 2021, and that the 2021 event remains sold out.

Glastonbury was one of countless events called off on account of COVID-19 in 2020. In the early days of the pandemic, a festival collapse claimed gatherings like Ultra Music Festival, Coachella Music & Arts Festival and Movement Electronic Music Festival in rapid succession, offering a glimpse of the economic turmoil to follow. As summer approached, Burning Man, Awakenings Festival and others followed suit.

Glastonbury festival has yet to announce 2021 dates at the time of writing.