United Kingdom. Monday, June 20, 2005.

When 34-year-old Somerset farmer Michael Eavis started the first Glastonbury Festival in 1970 - with Marc Bolan headlining and free milk for every festival-goer - there was little hint at what he had started.

Glastonbury was by no means the first or biggest rock festival to grace Britain's fields. But it was arguably the event that kickstarted the UK's love affair for outdoor music extravaganzas.

Thirty-five years on from the inaugural Glastonbury, the UK festival calendar offers something for almost everyone.

From hardened metal fans (Download) to clubbing mums (The Big Chill), from loud and lairy students (Reading) to chin-stroking fans of alternative culture (All Tomorrow's Parties) there seems to be something to whet every appetite.

Glastonbury 'catalyst'

Britain's festival culture is a direct response to the enduring success of Glastonbury, says NME's Paul Stokes.

Glastonbury's reputation for poor security - which consistently allowed thousands of festival-goers to see the event for free by jumping the fence - had been a hallmark until the event took a one-year break in 2001.

"The organisers really looked at that and brought the Mean Fiddler in, making Glastonbury a little bit more professional," Mr Stokes says.

"They got that super-fence in 2002, which means if you buy a ticket now for Glastonbury that's the only way you can get it. You can't just waltz in like people could in the past."

But what that also did was make it lose some of its rougher edges, and appeal to a more middle-class audience.

24-hour sell-out

In 2003, the demand for tickets suddenly jumped markedly. Instead of taking eight weeks for Glastonbury to sell out, as it had in 2002, in 2003 it only took one day. Glastonbury - tickets sell out in record time By then, the festival market had branched out.

Sir Richard Branson's Virgin brand had launched the V festival in 1996 - one which took a roster of acts to play on two festival sites over the course of a weekend.

It was so successful Reading initiated a similar approach in 1999, adding a sister event in Leeds.

Scottish music fans helped the growth of T in the Park, a festival owing much to the spirit of Reading, and offering similarly high-profile acts like the Prodigy, the Foo Fighters and The Beastie Boys.

"We did a bit of a revolution last year and put our tickets on sale at 2004 prices just after last year's event, and we sold a third of our capacity straight away," says T in the Park organiser Geoff Ellis.

"Then in February we put the rest of the tickets on sale, and were the first UK festival to sell out four days later," he says.

V Festival co-founder Bob Angus, who also runs concert promotion firm Metropolis Music, says people are back into live music again.

"Maybe some years ago dance culture was bigger, but now people seem to have gone back to guitar music and rock music," he adds.

The organisers of the V festivals were a consortium of promoters who saw a gap in the market.

"To set up a festival is a bit of a gamble. But what we basically did was set up a festival using the bands we already promoted, such as Pulp and Oasis," he recalls. "We saw the gap for something a bit more mainstream."

Festival 'holiday'

Melvin Benn, director of festivals for Mean Fiddler, says trying to work out why festivals are so popular now is not an exact science, but "the value they're offering is so good now".

The upsurge in festivals comes as people's lifestyle change, he believes.

"When I started going to festivals in the early 1970s, the thought that someone as old as 22 or 23 would go to a festival was unheard of. People that age were preparing to get married and get a mortgage.

"What's happened now is that a festival has become almost like a holiday. Instead of going away to Spain for two weeks, people are taking some of their holiday and taking five days off for Glastonbury or Reading."

Source : news.bbc.co.uk

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