Australian Blues Music Festival postponed until 2022

Published on 20 May 2020

The 2021 Australian Blues Music Festival has been postponed for a year, in light of the COVID-19 restrictions and uncertainty around when these restrictions on major events and festivals will ease.

Australian National Events (ANE) were engaged to undertake management and delivery of the festival for the 2020-2024 festivals. ANE rebranded and relaunched the event in 2020, under difficult circumstances following the summer bushfire crisis, and then rain across the weekend in February.

Despite this, numbers at the festival were reasonably strong, and feedback from the community, venues and performers was positive.

“It is a real shame that we will not have the Bluesfest in Goulburn in 2021, but it’s difficult to commit to an event that takes at least 6 months planning in the current uncertain climate” said Mayor Bob Kirk.

“Council tipped in $30,000 for the event this year and have committed to the same each year, however ANE still faced a deficit of $17,000 for the 2020 event.”

“By the time ANE is planning for the 2022 Bluesfest we hope business will be supportive and willing to jump on board to make it the best festival yet. It’s important that those commercial enterprises that benefit from the influx of people to our region for Bluesfest also jump on board to support it.”

Council staff will now also work with ANE to discuss alternative format options for the Festival to increase the viability of the event and visitation to Goulburn. A further report will come back to Council for consideration on this issue.