music & arts:Entry 2 of 3 in Festival Event Planning

MUSIC FESTIVAL PLANNING

This blog post is the second in a series of 3. It is a look into musical festival planning through the insights of one of Erie PA’s best event planners, Tammy Roche. If you haven’t read the first article, “Event Planning: Its All About the Creation,” check it out here.

WHAT IS THE CORNERSTONE OF A MUSIC FESTIVAL?

The music! Tammy has an entire committee dedicated to band and art sit selection, communication, negotiation and booking.  When you are planning on booking any acts, it is best to start as early as possible; especially if you are trying to acquire a national act.  Once the contact is made, the rest is all about striking the deal and following through.

ACQUIRING MUSIC

Typically with a national act, you need to get in contact with the agent. A lot of times, musicians will provide the contact information on their website, or the promoter of the event, pending their experience, may have a rolodex of contacts.  After making contact with the representing agent, Tammy’s music committee establishes themselves and their purpose.  The first two things that are brought up are availability and range of performance fee. These two pieces of information are the first cut off in whether or not that musician will be booked for your event.

WORK AND WHITTLE

The music committee, and whomever handles the festival finances, has an idea of their price range for performers.  This criteria is used to whittle down the multiple contacted artists into a pool within which a verbal agreement is made and immediately after, a written offer is sent. A similar process is used for regional and local acts, but typically, the contacts are not agents but band members or close relatives that act as managers.

TYPICAL CONTRACTS

Once verbal commitments are made, a legal contract is drawn up and processed.  Some of the clauses included in a performer’s contract could include:
- back line and provided instrumentation
- a technical rider and requirements for the PA
- hospitality including transportation, hotel, food, alcohol, etc
- merchandise sales
- promotion
- recording rights

A lot of times contracts will include a cancellation clause. It is really important to look at this line of the contract. This clause could specify weather, or stage conditions in which the performer WILL NOT have to perform. Make sure you check this or your show may not go up due to a small drizzle!

MUSIC = EXPERIENCE

The music you pick will be the ultimate vibe setter at the festival.  It is what will set your event apart from any other experience. People don’t often remember the vendors or promotions that went into the event. They remember the show that they saw! So keep the music in mind when planning all aspects of the festival.

Event Planning: Its All About the … Planning – Next week’s post will focus on logistics, people movement, and how to handle the actual day of the event.

The Blues and Jazz Festival is one of Nick’s favorite gigs at Raven Sound. Not only is it amazing to experience the atmosphere and music, it is just as great to be apart of it.

Work Hard, Take It Easy

Nick Corsi

Follow Me on Twitter: NickCorsi

music & arts: Entry 1 of 3 in Festival Event Planning

WITH WARM WEATHER COMES SWEET SOUNDS

Believe it or not, the summer is actually coming, and nice weather means one thing for music…outdoor concerts! But these concerts don’t just grow out of fields and shutdown streets, they grow from the fertile soils of hard work, teamwork and planning.

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing one of Erie, PA’s premiere event planners, Tammy Roche, Director of Marketing and Development at the Erie Art Museum. Each year the Art Museum puts on a fantastic Blues and Jazz Festival at Frontier Park in Erie, PA. Tammy plans the whole thing and has been nothing but successful. Here are her insights into outdoor festival event planning.

THE BASICS

We are assuming that the concert is an existing event, that is, it occurred last year.  For a multi-day event, Tammy is typically in the planning stages 9 months ahead of time. Planning starts with a debriefing for the previous year.  The team discusses issues such as the overal success and areas for improvement.  Once the initial bumps have been ironed, its time to be proactive.

“I want the event to be unlike any other event in the community” – Tammy Roche

COMMITTEES AND CATEGORIES

Planning is done with committees, by leveraging expertise and talent, more work is done, and it is done by qualified and passionate individuals. This is the key to event planning is being a facilitator, the  overall genius comes through individual contributions. In order to direct the proper talent to the proper outlet, the event is broken down into categories.  Normally there are sub-committees for each category:

• Music
• Logistics/Technical
• Vendors
  Crafter/Artisan Subcommittee
• Food/Alcohol
• Community Programming
• Promotional

MEETINGS AND CONTRIBUTION

After committees are established, a regular meeting schedule is derived within which tasks are created and feedback is required from everyone at every meeting. According to Tammy, the key to productive and effective event planning meetings is to make everyone feel like the are contributing … everyone leaves with a task and everyone reports back.

CREATING THE EXPERIENCE

Planning a cultural event needs to have some strategy behind it. Typically, Tammy thinks in terms of: “What does this event bring to the community?” The planning team must decide how the event will be something unique, fresh and new, and most importantly, something that you can’t always experience.  Thinking about the goal of the event is important. It is where the blue print for the experience comes from. Some goals include cultural development, community economic development,  or a cultural/charitable benefit.

DOWN TO BUSINESS

Once the entire committee is on the same page about strategy and goals, the rest of planning has a benchmark with which to work from. Everything from venue, music selection, vendor selection and gate payment will be build from the strategy.

EARLY PRIORITIES

Let the planning process truly begin. The proper committee proceeds by locking down the venue as far in advance as possible. Typically, with an ongoing festival, this is done immediately after the THIS year for the NEXT year.  Then permitting and ordinances need to be worked out.  If it is a public park or location, the proper public leaders need to contacted to establish logistical items such as parking, restroom facilities, after dark permits, electricity, noise, etc.

EVENT PLANNING – ITS ALL ABOUT THE MUSIC

The next step is the musical experience. Next week’s blog will completely focus on the musical aspect of the festival.  We will explore selection, booking, contracts, and production.

The Blue and Jazz Festival is one of Nick’s favorite gigs at Raven Sound. Not only is it amazing to experience the atmosphere and music, it is just as great to be apart of it.

Work Hard, Take It Easy

Nick Corsi

Follow Me on Twitter: NickCorsi