A traditionally festival loving nation, it’s no surprise that the UK tradition generally sees a large proportion of festival goers – with 2016 figures showing 60% (up from 37% the previous year) of those in attendance were women! With Europe averaging around 45+% also in 2016 (and no doubt reflecting similar trajectories), time and time again line ups fail to reflect this. Why is this? There needs to be a shift in the collective attitude of what ‘the best’ means, whose methodology are we using to determine what is ‘good’? If the festival curators, bookers, agents, producers, technicians, radio hosts, i.e. the gatekeepers of access are for the most part men that reflect their own particular notion of that is ‘good’, this is what will need to be challenged and change to bring true global innovation and diversity of talent and thought. And not only in gender, but to crucially reflect all intersectional markers.

Find the Statista figures for UK here and for Europe here.