After six years, the Squamish Valley Music Festival was abruptly cancelled last week, without even a word to the 20,000 Squamish residents who hosted the huge festival every year.
Last year, gate admissions were almost 120,000 over four days, and campgrounds had been set up throughout the town for the throngs of festival-goers. The big acts in 2015 included Drake and Mumford & Sons; a year earlier, Eminem and Bruno Mars thrilled the crowds. Music from the main stage could be heard almost a kilometre away – whether residents wanted to or not.
Hosting such a huge festival in a small town created some lineups and congestion and kept our police, ambulance and hospital staff busy, but overall, most residents seemed to support the festival. It not only gave our youth an exciting event, if they could afford the tickets; it also brought revenue to local businesses and organizations renting out its land for campgrounds.
The Squamish Chief first got wind of the cancellation from a tweet by a music promoter in Toronto – and when we called, we learned that tweeter didn’t know much about Squamish or have direct knowledge about the festival. The promoter was simply speculating. SVMF was already a few weeks behind in announcing its 2016 lineup.
In December, the executive producer, Paul Runnals, told The Squamish Chief that the festival would go up to 140,000 total attendees and would announce the lineup early this year, which included new, creative programming and other “enhancements to the customer experience.”
But last Tuesday, upon learning of the tweet, The Squamish Chief immediately started calling BrandLive and Live Nation Canada, which produced the event, and was told the SVMF executive producer was tied up in meetings and couldn’t comment. The next day, we were informed he would not be commenting at all.
That’s the moment when the festival website changed with the words we had been dreading: “We have made the extremely difficult decision to not proceed with the 2016 festival.”
While Mayor Patricia Heintzman has been stuck fielding media calls for a decision she says she can’t explain, BrandLive is still keeping mum on the reasons for the cancellation, a huge loss for the town. The 2015 festival poured $15 million into Squamish’s economy, according to producers.
It’s almost certain the U.S. dollar exchange rate was a factor, as the big acts are paid in U.S. dollars. And there’s plenty of competition from other festivals; in fact, BrandLive just last month acquired Alberta festival producer Union Events.
But, in the end, Squamish is left guessing. After graciously hosting the huge festival for six summers, we believe we’re owed at least a short explanation.
– Editor Christine Endicott
