During the fall and winter season, most of the music festivals out there will accept new applicants.
These things take a long while to set in place and even if you can apply well into the spring, there are advantages to being early. As an example it’s a lot cheaper to apply to Canadian Music Week months in advance. Still it’s worth being ready to send out your EPK and meet some people.
There are paid opportunities and ones that are more about getting some festival experience under your belt.
I’m not here to tell you what gigs to take, only to give you a heads up.
Prepare your digital press kit
I have a PDF with a bio, some pics and links to all my relevant stuff.
Most festivals will either have a contact email, where you and ChatGPT can prepare a nice little email, or they have webforms, where they will ask for the equivalent of your press kit as part of the process. Either way you need to think about all the answers ahead of time.
As you go through the first application form, take some time to look at each thing they are asking for. Make sure you understand it and choose the right options. Literally reach out and ask them about it if you need to. Getting booked in music is about clearly identifying who your audience is and why promoters/event planners should book you.
This is not easy to do, but you need to take the time to figure out what your brand is before you can sell it.
You should also prepare a musician CV and have that ready to go.
Once you have that ready, you can start to apply.
Research every opportunity like it was a job
Every festival is different.
They have different cultures. They book different genres. Each one is a unique experience and should be treated as such. Some festivals will be a better fit for you than others, trust your gut. Most importantly, when you contact them make sure your approach is unique.
With tools like ChatGPT, you can easily research a festival and get a sense for who attends. With that insight you can tweak your bio and application info to better meet what they want. Basically do the same thing you do when you are job hunting.
If you have a few songs that slap, choose the ones that best reflect the audience who will hit the festival.
Do yourself some favours and don’t blindly spam.
Prepare to spend some bread during the process of getting booked
The reality is you will need to spend some money here.
Most festivals have application fees. Some festivals may require you to get insurance or handle logistics. Chances are if you are a rapper, you’ll need to figure out your own DJ. This level of music is not the same as performing at the local open mic/show with the local DJ everyone knows. This is a different league.
The better prepared you are going into it, the greater your chances of getting some bookings will be. Keep in mind these folk are going to be watching your socials and spying on you. Part of your plan has to be to stay interesting online so that when people research you, they like what they see.
I’m not saying fake numbers or do corny shit, I’m saying find a way to captivate your audience.
Still there’s some money out there in festival land, get ready and go get it.
Live Long and Prosper Everyone
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