New multi-centre format put forward to revive Cambridge Folk Festival
A city-wide, multi-venue format is being considered to relaunch Cambridge Folk Festival next year – but questions remain over the decision-making process.
The city council says the new format would protect what makes the festival special while ensuring it can be delivered in a more inclusive and affordable way for attendees.
But opposition councillors argue there are unanswered questions and big weaknesses in marketing and leadership identified in a review that are not addressed by the proposals.
“The proposed new model certainly brings in a new dimension,” said Cllr Tim Bick, leader of the Liberal Democrat group. “It will be interesting to see if indoor events around the city will offset a shrinking of the open-air event at Cherry Hinton Hall.”
Musician and author Ian A Anderson, who performed at the festival for many years – and has organised folk festivals himself – told the Cambridge Independent: “What surely makes the folk festival is the fact that it’s an open-air site, with camping, and shunting it into a lot of venues around Cambridge I think would be counter-intuitive.
“I don’t think it’s what people have over the years gone to the festival to experience.”
The 2025 festival, which was due to mark the event’s 60th anniversary, was suddenly cancelled by the Labour-run city council in January, initially without explanation.
A “fallow” year was agreed instead to enable a full review of the festival by council staff, supported by a specialist consultancy and involving engagement with audiences, sector experts and local folk clubs.
The authority says the 2024 festival incurred a loss of more than £320,000 due to increased costs and reduced income. It adds that ticket and camping sales were down “significantly” on pre-Covid levels, with camping revenue having halved since 2016. Meanwhile equipment costs have increased by 60 per cent since 2016.
The review indicated that there would be no way to continue with the traditional four-day festival at Cherry Hinton Hall without the council accepting significant financial risk and being prepared to subsidise it by a potential £500,000 each year, at a time when the authority is already having to find annual savings of £11.5 million.
A two-day event at Cherry Hinton Hall, with two medium-sized stages and a more basic camping offer, would significantly reduce the infrastructure costs compared to the previous four-day event, which had more stages and campsite facilities.
Under the new proposals, Cherry Hinton Hall, the spiritual home of the festival, would remain the anchor venue, with a scaled down two-day outdoor event and a more basic camping offer, while additional venues across the city would host folk events throughout the week.
The council says the new approach – with the potential for scaling according to demand and growth – would seek to celebrate the festival’s early independent grassroots values, as well as looking to the future and enabling the festival’s economic benefit to be spread to more parts of the city.
Councillors were given an update on the festival at a scrutiny committee meeting on Tuesday (1 July) but there was criticism of the administration for failing to provide the full officer report and the consultants report.
Cllr Bick said: “I am pleased if Labour believe they’ve come up with a good formula to keep the folk festival viable. I sincerely hope they’re right! But they’re making it difficult for anyone else to judge. That’s because, for the second time this year, they’ve orchestrated fundamental decision-making over the festival to be taken very defensively, without any discussion with others across the council.
“The in-depth review that they’ve published doesn’t inspire confidence. It highlights a big weakness in the way the festival has been marketed and a leadership short on vision.
Other healthy festivals clearly didn’t have to cancel their event, like Cambridge did. Though cost inflation was clearly a factor in last year’s losses, the bigger contributor appears to be a shortfall in ticket sales. Feedback the council already obtained last year indicated that disappointing ticket sales were due to a headline line-up that people didn’t see as value for money and a calendar clash with Latitude.
“How does the new plan address last year’s weaknesses? How will council staff manage the increased complexity of a more fragmented event? How can the Cherry Hinton Hall and the locations elsewhere really fit together? Does this all still add up to England’s 'foremost folk festival’? These are the kind of questions that really need answers.
“We must obviously hope for the best, but I can’t help feeling that it would have benefited from a proper opportunity to challenge and kick the tyres - now, not after the event.”
Green leader Cllr Naomi Bennett said her group are “cautiously optimistic” about a city-wide alternative, but say they need to see more details.
“Nowhere in the report does the council mention that one of the reasons that last year’s folk festival lost money was that after our folk festival announced its dates, Latitude announced that it would be on the same dates – normally the two festivals are a week apart,” said Cllr Bennett. “While council officers can try to negotiate with Latitude’s organisers, they can’t control the actions of a third party. ”
She said this means that there will always be a risk of competition and lower ticket sales.
Mr Anderson believes the artistic direction of the event is to blame for falling ticket sales with other festivals keeping afloat and thriving post-Covid. He said the festival had “definitely lost its mojo”.
“Cambridge’s ticket sales have been dropping where others have been managing to sustain their numbers, or even increase them. That’s probably the side they need to look at, rather than cost-saving on putting it on,” he said.
He said that, musically, people are “looking for the exciting stuff that’s going on now, which can be across the board, from the very traditional to the really experimental”.
“But they don’t really have their finger on it anymore,” he added.
Cllr Antionette Nestor, cabinet member for culture, economy and skills, said protecting the festival’s legacy has been key to the review.
“At the same time, the council cannot afford to subsidise the festival by half a million pounds a year in the long-term, so we need to address the changes in audience behaviour – such as the decline in people wanting to pay for weekend camping tickets – and ensure the festival returns in a financially resilient way,” she said.
“It is common for festivals to take a fallow year to give organisers time when they would usually be organising that year’s festival to pause and reflect on how the festival can stay current and engaging to new audiences. Even without the financial pressures we faced last year, it would have been important to conduct this review.”
The council says the refreshed format would support an exciting and cutting-edge programme of music and events taking place in Cambridge’s renowned music venues and performance spaces across the city.
It notes the multi-venue format has proved to be very successful for Celtic Connections in Glasgow, the Brighton Festival, and Edinburgh’s Fringe festival, and would create potential for the festival to scale and become more financially resilient for the future.
The proposals will be considered by councillors at a meeting of the cabinet on Tuesday, 15 July at 5pm.