This pertinent question posed by such a prominent festival set me wondering: how far have we really come over the past 10 years toward a more gender-balanced festival scene here in the U.K.?
According to a recent Ticketmaster survey, almost half of festival goers believe that gender diversity has improved lately, yet the majority of those still noted white-male acts as their ‘dream’ headliners. And here poses the conundrum: an illusion that we’re heading in the right direction with festival lineups. So with this in mind, I’ve taken the 10 largest U.K. music festivals and charted them over the past 10 years to see if, in terms of headliners at least, whether they have indeed improved their gender diversity or whether we’re falling for a futile illusion.
In 2017, the BBC conducted a survey which considered 14 festivals and over 600 headliners in previous years, finding 8 out of 10 slots were taken up by all-male acts and a quarter of those slots were recycled by the same 20 acts. Furthermore, through my own research (below) charting 274 headliners between 2010-19, 91% of slots were taken by male artists, and with that, 85% of them were white. Out of the 10 most successful festivals in this country, Latitude Festival forged the best reputation of gender ‘balance’ amongst their headliners with a grand total of 20% charted as female - much better at least than Reading & Leeds or Download Festival who couldn’t chart a single female headliner (not counting 'duo-headliners').
Nonetheless, if we peruse further through the lineups, particularly for Latitude and Glastonbury Festivals in 2019, both of them proved promising with nearly 40% of their total listing containing female acts. Unsurprisingly, an entrenched trend seems to be set according to certain genres of festivals: rock & pop lean toward male-heavy lineups, with electronic, hip-hop & indie becoming more favourable with the women folk. Yet with white-male ‘guitar’ music on a descending slope and female attendance of festivals reaching above 50% throughout the U.K., perhaps now would be the best time for these larger festivals to enact a radical change amongst their headliners?
To many, these sorts of questions seem vapidly naïve given the current economic climate which necessitates ‘legendary’ rock acts as a bedrock of stability year in, year out. And so I return to the main point of this piece: festival lineups must do more to healthily reflect those attending. According to various Statista surveys, the majority of festival attendance of the past decade came from young women who generally prioritised a festival experience over booking a foreign holiday. Let’s feed this hunger by casting a wider net over potentially newer audiences through diversifying lineups rather than recycling the ‘tried and tested’ methods of old.
“There simply aren’t many female acts available these days.”
This sort of statement has been claimed by one of the curators for Field Day Festival, as well as many other curators in today’s day. Whilst the personal knee-jerk retort to this would involve the word “bullshit”, one has to consider the environment in which this comes from - an inherently male-dominated one. Record labels, producers, promoters, management, all contribute to this continuous male-favourable discourse, inevitably resulting in male-prominent music (now charting 80% across recent music charts).
Beyond this, exclusivity or ‘radius’ clauses further exacerbate the situation for festival bookers marking a specific radius from which performers are not permitted to perform. Whilst it benefits some bookers to retain a certain ‘uniqueness’ for their festival, others who are willing to venture into female-led performers are left frustrated year after year.
If the genre of such a festival proves heavily one-sided toward male performers, say Download Festival, then more must be done toward the grassroots level of the music industry: more recording opportunities as well as female bookers and promoters will ultimately contribute to a better reflection of music on the UK's main stages. Whilst the challenge of cracking the metaphorical ‘nut’ with ‘rock’ festivals' synonymity with male performers, greater urge must be given to those booking to jump off the old, white men's cliff and take a leap of diversified faith.
So just how far have U.K. festivals come over the past 10 years in terms of diversifying their headliners? Not very far at all. However, the trajectory does prove somewhat promising further down the bill - particularly those willing to expand their musical tastes. The onus still remains on our larger festivals to initiate a top-down change when it comes to booking their headliners - if this trend is set, others will follow. With some growing female initiative groups pushing such changes (see below), as well as the PRS-led 50/50 pledge for festivals by 2022, the scene ultimately is heading in the right direction. Take risks in your bookings, offer more grassroots-level opportunities for musicians, and start actively hiring women and members of BAME communities behind the scenes of it all - let’s finally feed the hunger of more than half of our festivals’ audiences.
Further links to some of the great female-led initiative groups spearheading this change:
Comments