Glastonbury Festival has been granted a licence to hold a one-day festival this year.
It was announced in January that the world-famous festival was officially cancelled for 2021 due to the ongoing global pandemic. Around two months later, it was revealed that lead organiser Emily Eavis had applied for a licence to run a smaller event at their usual Worthy Farm site.
After much talk and speculation, it’s now been officially announced that the local governing bodies have approved their licence request, and they are planning to host a 50,000-person capacity event in September named Equinox.
The one-day event will have no camping and utilise only a single stage of music hosted at the iconic Pyramid Stage usually used by the main Glastonbury Festival.
It’s expected that final confirmation of the event and a reveal of the music line-up will appear in the coming weeks pending the UK’s progress with fighting back the pandemic and a successful vaccine program.
Giving a statement, Emily Eavis said Equinox would in essence be a large scale version of the Pilton Party, which is Glastonbury Festival’s annual fundraising gig that says “thank you” to villagers, workers and local people.
In a discussion with Matt Everitt on BBC 6 Music, Emily Eavis added: “We are going to throw everything at 2022. The light is coming in. We’re able to move out of this very awkward time and plan to be back in fields again and to be watching live music and camping for five days outside with 200,000 other people. That is now a possibility and it’s looking highly likely that that will happen next year. So we’re booking bands for that [now]. It’s hugely reassuring to be able to actually plan something that might happen.”
Mendip council is the local governing body that granted the event’s licence, and the council’s Licencing Chairperson, Sam Phripp said: “Any event would have to be COVID-safe, and Mendip will work with other organisations and the organisers to make sure that’s the case.”
H/T: DJ Mag
