Australian Music Festivals 2021

Posted on Oct 29, 2020 in Festivals, Lists and Bests

Australian festivals with links

Australian Music Festivals 2021

Over 300 Events

Frankly, it’s been a little difficult for us to start this next edition of Australian Music Festivals.

This is our third version and we’ve evolved with the task each year, researching to grow the events listed, checking dates, links and locations regularly. A bit of work, but a worthy aim to compile the most comprehensive list we can and hopefully be of value to artists, industry people and pundits.

Then came the pandemic.

In 2020 Listening Through The Lens covered Mona Foma (Tasmania) and Port Fairy Folk Festival. The last day at Port Fairy we were starting to think about social distancing and, by the end of the week, all Australia was in Lock Down.

While most parts of the country have manged the health crisis extremely well and life is going on COVID-normal, there are still little signs of live music on any significant scale being deemed safe to go ahead soon.

The 2020 version of our list became of little use beyond March. Like it was…er…infected with ambivalence. Watching the wheels stop as each event grappled with the agonising, but inevitable, decision to pull the pin. CHECK OUT OUR EVENT CANCELLATION ARTICLE

Not that WE have anything to complain about at this site.

Spare a thought for those with a close financial and emotional interest in these over-300 events – investors, organisers, artists, road crews, vendors, the local community…

But I guess we need to start thinking about dusting off our collective selves and begin to think about what is possible, to find some semblance of hope – a platform to move ahead as it is likely that many events will be allowed to proceed with people gloriously assembled again, albeit in no doubt some limited form.

So here are the humble beginnings of our 2021 list. The dates for most festivals are listed as to be announced (tba) for valid reason. If there’s a line through a date, that means that formal dates have at some stage been announced but organisers subsequently have had to cancel. If there’s a line through tba, the event has been cancelled prior to any dates being published. We’ll keep returning to websites to check status. Fingers crossed everyone!

We started this list for much the same reasons as our USA version.  It’s hard to find a single location that has a sufficient number and details of the many music festivals that take place in Australia each year.  We also like a simple list with relevant website links for easy connection, plus in some sort of intelligible order.  

The genres we used initially were under the loose banner of ‘roots music’ but, as we have progressed, found any genre definitions to be overly restrictive.  So we have branched out into any event where music is showcased we could find.  Often most of these gatherings have a wide range of artists and styles anyway.  Let you, the reader, be the judge when you look at the line-up as to the level of attraction attending a specific event.

Any corrections or omissions, please drop a comment below or email us at team@listeningthroughthelens.com

2020 FESTIVALS LINK

2021 FESTIVALS BELOW

UPDATED 15 NOVEMBER 2020

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Australian festivals with links

Australian festivals with links

Australian festivals with links