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Too Many Performance Artists to Manage?

Andy Robertson

Some of the largest music festivals can have up to 3,000 performance artists booked to perform over a period of several days using multiple stages. How can an event organiser manage such a huge number of artists to deliver seamless performances without a glitch? Now most organisers use a combination of technology and skilled teams to achieve this.  


The numbers can be staggering to comprehend, particularly when looking at one of the largest most well know music festivals in the world, Glastonbury. In 2019 they had 2,900 performance artists booked who played on 75 different stages over a period of six days. This is the kind of logistical challenge that would test even the most experienced event organiser.

Larger music festival organisers will likely have an army of Artist Liaison Managers coordinating contracts, schedules and logistics which in days gone by were done on paper and involved constant phone calls. Times have changed and now most of these tasks can be done using specialist software with unique functionality and there is currently a good choice of platforms available to consider.

Typically, the features of a good software platform will enable the recording of scheduled bookings, storage of contracts and payment details. In addition, the ability to record catering, riders, travel and accommodation requirements plus the uploading of artist’s biog profiles with links to the organisers event website and social media presence is essential. Most important of all is the ability for seamless collaboration between all parties so changes and alterations can be made simply and quickly and communicated in real time. If an artist needs to change their time of arrival a good software package will make it easy to reschedule sets by time and date with automated notifications to Stage Managers, Producers, Engineers, Hospitality Managers (for catering and riders) plus updates to the event’s website schedule. All this should be automated including confirmation of any changes.

A software platform that has the full functionality to enable artist management is only part of the solution. An element of face to face personal contact between the Artist Liaison Manager and the artist’s management team is also about building and keeping a good personal relationship. A physical call or meeting can resolve any issues faster that something done via electronic communication. However, looking into the future of music festivals in 2021 using a software platform for artist management is going to be more important than ever because in the new normal face to face meetings will be kept to a minimum and artists and event organisers will have to rely more heavily on electronic schedules, document transfers and communications.

When using a live music event software management platform like FestivalPro users get all the functionality they need manage every aspect of artist management. The guys who are responsible for this software have been in the front line of event management for many years and the features are built from that experience and are performance artists themselves. The FestivalPro platform is easy to use and has built in features that help Artist Liaison Managers work on all aspects involved in putting on a successful music festival, even when hundreds or thousands of artists are performing the platform is scalable to allow for the largest events.   

Photo by Thibault Trillet from Pexels

Andy Robertson
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