{"id":13212,"date":"2021-04-10T07:12:37","date_gmt":"2021-04-10T07:12:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/?p=13212"},"modified":"2026-04-18T19:34:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-18T19:34:31","slug":"blended-festivals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/2021\/04\/blended-festivals\/","title":{"rendered":"Edinburgh Festivals 2021: a blended spirit"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Will the Edinburgh Festivals go ahead this summer? And if they do, what will they look like?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot riding on the answer to those questions \u2013 the livelihoods of thousands of artists, the fate of hundreds of businesses in the Scottish capital, the health of the UK\u2019s performing arts industry as a whole.<\/p>\n

If a 2019 report by the Centre for Economics and Business Research is to be believed, it is a billion-pound question. That\u2019s how much the August events are worth to the Scottish economy – \u00a3500 million in direct spending, and \u00a3500 million more to local businesses in Edinburgh and the surrounding area.<\/p>\n

Over the winter, with the second wave of coronavirus sweeping across the country, the prospect looked black. In January, when Glastonbury Festival \u2013 an event of similar size \u2013 was cancelled, the chances of another festival-free Scottish summer still seemed high. With Spring, though, has come the success of the UK\u2019s vaccination programme and just as the buds are beginning to blossom, so too is hope that the Edinburgh Festivals \u2013 the International Festival, the Book Festival, the Art Festival and their sprawling sister the Fringe \u2013 will be back in August.<\/p>\n

The Scottish government\u2019s current \u201croadmap\u201d states that \u201csmall-scale outdoor and indoor events\u201d can resume on May 17th<\/sup>, \u201csubject to capacity constraints\u201d. From the end of June, a month before the beginning of the Edinburgh festivals, the restrictions on capacity will be eased. All of that is heavily caveated \u2013 a sudden surge in case numbers remains a real danger \u2013 but none of it precludes large-scale live events occurring in August. Crucially, though, none of it is set in stone \u2013 the dates in the roadmap could be brought forward, but they could just as likely be pushed back.<\/p>\n

We have a plan<\/h2>\n

The difficulty for organisers is that the Edinburgh Festivals are enormous events that involve hundreds of venues, require millions of pounds of investment, and need months of preparation from parties across different sectors. Calls for a government-backed insurance scheme seem far-fetched, so without certainty over what will and what will not be legally allowed in August \u2013 and with organisers still reeling from the financial hit of a 2020 largely without live events \u2013 little concrete planning can take place.<\/p>\n

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Positive signs do keep coming, though. On March 25, the government confirmed it was actively working on a plan for \u201cmajor events\u201d to return in the summer. The next day, Glasgow\u2019s TRNSMT, Scotland\u2019s biggest music festival, revealed its plans to go ahead in early September. Another event, the brand new Out East music festival in Longniddry, announced its intention to host 6000 people over a weekend in early August.<\/p>\n

The official Edinburgh festival organisations remain tight-lipped about their return. All of them \u2013 the EIF, the Book Festival, the Art Festival and the Fringe \u2013 insist they will go ahead in some form, but none will confirm how confident they are about in-person events being part of the package. Francesca Hegyi, executive director of the EIF, the venerable granddad of August\u2019s events, said: \u201cWe are still optimistic that the EIF will go ahead this summer and are working closely with our colleagues in public health, local authorities and Scottish Government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bridging the digital divide<\/h2>\n

The smart money, at present, is on this year\u2019s festivals being some sort of hybrid involving both online and in-person events \u2013 not purely digital like they were last summer, but not on the same scale as they were in 2019, either. There just isn\u2019t the confidence in Scotland\u2019s coronavirus recovery for the level of investment that would require \u2013 and certainly not in the global situation. The festivals, it is worth remembering, are international events, involving audiences and artists from dozens of different countries.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t say that there will definitely be shows on here in August,\u201d says Gareth Nicholls, artistic director of the Traverse Theatre.<\/a> \u201cThere are lots of conversations happening between all sorts of partners across the city to see what is viable, and we are just one of the voices in that room. My job, at the moment, is to look at work that is suitable to be presented in several different contexts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDigital is going to be a big part of what we do this August, definitely,\u201d he continues. \u201cHopefully live will be as well. But if it is live, it will be a pared down version of what we usually offer. I think it will be a lot more local than it usually is, but the digital aspect will give it the international reach it usually has.\u201d<\/p>\n

David Greig, artistic director of the Royal Lyceum Theatre, is slightly more positive \u2013 although he is not responsible for the venue in August, when the EIF takes over its stage for a month. Speaking ahead of the release of Mark Ravenhill\u2019s Angela,<\/a> the first audio play in the Lyceum\u2019s new Sound Stage series, he said that he was hoping to open his building to audiences in July.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAnd then I would like there to be shows on of some sort during the festivals,\u201d Greig continues. \u201cEverybody wants there to be theatre in Edinburgh in August and is pulling out all the stops to make that happen. The difficulty is that there are just so many ifs and buts surrounding that. Right now, everything is a shot in the dark, and shots in the dark are risky when you are on the breadline financially. You can\u2019t afford to miss so you\u2019ve got to hold fire until you are really confident.\u201d<\/p>\n

Festivals for whom?<\/h2>\n

The thing organisers need most is clarity \u2013 but clarity is one of the many things in short supply. And, amid all the uncertainty, another question looms large. Not will<\/em>\u00a0 the Edinburgh Festivals go ahead this summer, but should<\/em>\u00a0 the Edinburgh Festivals go ahead this summer?<\/p>\n

The August events have grown year-on-year. The biggest of them all, the Fringe, hosted 3841 shows in 2019, up nearly 300 from the year before, and ticket sales topped three million for the first time in the festival\u2019s history. The argument that it has grown too big for a city of 500,000 people has become more and more credible with each annual increase. Many have pointed out that the pause caused by the pandemic could be used as an opportunity to reflect and redesign the festivals to better suit the city that hosts them.<\/p>\n

The objections extend beyond the common complaint that thronging crowds make life impossible for locals. The festivals\u2019 record on environmental sustainability is poor \u2013 its carbon footprint is huge, as the amount of waste it produces. Exploitation of workers is rife, too \u2013 low pay, long-hours, and appalling work conditions are everywhere. Then there is the issue of accommodation \u2013 the annual August Airbnb boom is one of the driving factors of Edinburgh\u2019s housing crisis. Then there is the issue of profits being sucked elsewhere by companies based in London for eleven months of the year.<\/p>\n

These are valid concerns that should be addressed with more urgency by the Scottish government and event organisers. Their counter-argument is to recognise how extraordinary the Edinburgh Festivals are despite their flaws, and how fortunate Edinburgh\u2019s residents and businesses are to have the world\u2019s largest arts event arrive on their doorstep every August. Even conservative figures from 2015 estimate that the festivals represent one percent of Edinburgh\u2019s GDP. Without them, the city would be poorer, both culturally and financially.<\/p>\n

You’re having a laugh<\/h2>\n

This paradox \u2013 the brilliance and beauty of the festivals on the one hand, the ugliness and exploitation of them on the other \u2013 has defined Edinburgh\u2019s summer for decades. Will they go ahead this year? Almost certainly. Will there be in-person events? Probably, but certainly not on the scale of previous years. Should they go ahead? The answer depends on who you ask.<\/p>\n

Speaking as someone whose professional and personal life owes a lot to the Edinburgh Festivals, I recognise that they have big problems to solve, but would be devastated were their in-person element to be delayed again to 2022.<\/p>\n

The clincher, for me, is laughter. When I think of August in Edinburgh, I think of weird and wonderful theatre shows, pints of cider in plastic glasses, and sweaty strolls down a jam-packed Royal Mile. Most of all, though, I think of laughter. In 2020, when the festivals were forced into vastly reduced online offerings, I thought of the laughter lost to coronavirus.<\/p>\n

Three million tickets were sold at the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe to 60,000 performances. Assuming the 2020 edition would have been just as big, and assuming every show lasted an hour and made every member of its audience laugh for just one minute of that hour, that\u2019s three million minutes of laughter. 50,000 hours of laughter. 5.7 years of laughter. All lost to the pandemic. If we can safely start to reclaim some of that laughter this summer, we should.<\/p>\n

[Update 13 April: Edinburgh International Festival announces a return in August, with shorter events in outdoor venues <\/em>BBC Scotland<\/em> ]<\/a><\/p>\n

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\u00a0<\/p>\n

Featured image: Whiteout (2016) by David Monteith Hodge \u00a9 Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society\u00a0Two lower images also by David Monteith Hodge\u00a0\u00a9 Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society; 2010 street scene\u00a0\u00a9 Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, CC BY-SA 3.0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Update: The show must go on with the EIF etc staged in three outdoor venues. See more here <\/a>and here<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“In 2020, when the festivals were forced into vastly reduced online offerings, I thought of the laughter lost to coronavirus…50,000 hours of laughter. 5.7 years of laughter. All lost to the pandemic. If we can safely start to reclaim some of that laughter this summer, we should.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":349,"featured_media":13287,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[297,519],"class_list":["post-13212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-edinburgh-fringe","tag-edinburgh-international-festival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/349"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13212"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18585,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13212\/revisions\/18585"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sceptical.scot\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}