Iain - thanks for taking the time to respond. I appreciate it's pretty easy for someone like me to sit and make suggestions about bands, but I'd be really interested to know about the main barriers you face when trying to get bands to the Music Festival. Is it cost, availability, clashes with other festivals, event not big enough for their ego's....... etc, etc.
Sheik, sorry for the delay getting back to you. The main barrier is the cost of the bands and the fact that they normally don’t want to play to an audience of less than 2,000. We have been fortunate in the past to have managed to persuade bands like Deacon Blue, Idlewild and the Stranglers to the Festival by selling the intimate concert angle to them. Over the last four years we have approached loads of different bands and it is really a case of catching one when they are looking for, or just willing to play a smaller venue.
I do feel that possibly the Saturday Vic concert has been affected slightly by the Connect Festival but I also believe if we attract the right band it will sell anyway.
One of the ideas we have been looking at is, if it is a bigger name band could we charge a bit more for a ticket, this way we can offer the band more. The thing is we really don’t want to do this in case we price the tickets too high for people to pay. It may be that if we can’t attract a big enough name every year we may chop and change the type of concerts that we hold on the Saturday night.
We are currently checking out bands for next year so by all means keep the ideas coming, our way of thinking is that unless you approach a band you never know if they would actually do the gig.
Take there would be no chance of getting the Proclaimers down for the festival, I know they've been before but that wasn't linked to the music festival. One of the few scottish bands who appeal to a wide range of ages and would be a guaranteed sell out.
Campbell, the Proclaimers are touring at that time but have not finalised their dates yet, they say they could be anywhere in the world that weekend!!
Excuse my ignorance.....what are the dates for 2009 please, ? Sounds like it will be worth putting in the diary
Elizabeth, the Festival date is always on the second last Saturday in August, that way we don’t clash with either the Cowal Games or the World’s making next years date August 20th – 23rd.
Iain