www.list.co.uk/aroundtownWhat’sOn
■ Books ■ Clubs ■ Comedy ■ Film ■ Kids 34 36 42 44 58
59 ■ LGBT 61 ■ Music ■ Theatre 77 ■ Visual Art 81
Around Town
The Outsider Festival
www.list.co.uk/aroundtown Hitlist ART, AUTHORS, RANTS, GHOSTS*
Best fest forward?
Kirstin Innes talks to to Pete Irvine, author of Scotland the Best and the director of Unique Events, about the future of Scotland’s specialist festivals in 2010
S cotland’s status as a country of many festivals has been wavering in the last couple of years. The confidence that led to new weekenders, biennials and events celebrating Scottish food, traditional music and even trees popping up almost every week during 2006 and 2007 really took a knock as the recession hit. While no-one seriously expects that any of our biggest events (T in the Park, the Edinburgh Festivals juggernaut and the Glasgow Comedy Festival, for example) will struggle for audiences in 2010, there’s certainly an air of caution among many events organisers.
2008 and 2009 were marked by a number of high- profile festival closures: Big In Falkirk, The Outsider, and the sadly-missed Connect Festival were among those forced to take down their tents. Scotland The Best author Pete Irvine, who runs Unique Events, the company responsible for The Outsider as well as more recession-proof events such as Edinburgh’s Hogmanay, will be coming to Glasgow as part of Celtic Connections, to discuss the future of festivals in a post-Homecoming Scotland. The List pinned him down for a quick chat on that very topic just before Christmas.
‘Homecoming, I think, was a generally positive thing for events in Scotland last year; precisely
because it was an event-led campaign, and there was a bit of extra cash available to events organisers. However, I think the coming year is going to be challenging for us. This isn’t a time to start new festivals, and the ones that survive are going to be mainly consolidating an existing audience base. If I was giving advice to other events organisers, I’d say you have to know your niche, understand where your audience is coming from and be creative and confident; you have to have a real reason to exist. I don’t think we need any more comedy or traditional music festivals, I think we’re maxed out on food festivals too; in fact, Edinburgh and Glasgow are pretty stuffed with festivals.’
Irvine still sees some hope out there in festival land, however. He’s enthusiastic about Celtic Connections and the upcoming Glasgow International Festival, as well as some of the quirkier, smaller events featured in his book: the Paps of Jura Hill Race, and the Mountain Bike World Cup. Finally, he suggests that all might not be lost for those much-missed fests mentioned above, either. ‘I think you might see Big in Falkirk returning in a different form at some point. And while we’re not going to run The Outsider this year, we’ve still definitely got plans for it in the future.’
✽✽ The Link A charity art exhibition and auction by musicians and artists who have musical connections. Contributing artists include King Creosote, Gordon Anderson, Jenny Soep, Christian Ward, Little Pebble, Sean Dooley and Duglas T Stewart. Central Library, Music Library, Edinburgh, until Sat 16 Jan. ✽✽ An Evening With Henry Rollins Confessional comedy and spoken word from this iron- pumping legend of Black Flag fame. O2 Academy, Glasgow, Wed 13 Jan. ✽✽ Edinburgh Ghost Hunt Get your Scooby Doo on and hunt for ghosts in the Niddry Street Vaults. Niddry Street Vaults, Edinburgh, Sat 16 Jan. ✽✽ The Royal Scottish Geographical Society: Connecting Food, Soil and the Planet Patrick Holden, director of the Soil Association, gives a talk on the importance of sustainable food production. University of Glasgow, Boyd Orr Building, Wed 20 Jan. ✽✽ Unreliable Narrators: Artists, Editors, Creators Colin Fraser of Anon Poetry Magazine and the National Galleries’ Daniel F Herrmann discuss issues of authorship in contemporary art and literature. National Gallery of Scotland: Hawthornden Lecture Theatre, The Mound, Thu 21 Jan. 7–21 Jan 2010 THE LIST 31