News

​Numerous festivals commit to gender-equal line-ups by 2022

A 50/50 gender split for future music events

PRS Foundation’s music industry initiative Keychange has recruited over 45 music festivals and conferences to join their goal of creating 50/50, gender-balanced music festival line-ups by the year 2022.

Along with multiple associates and sponsors, well-known international festivals such as Iceland Airwaves, Mutek and Reeperbahn Festival are amongst those who have decided to work towards - and furthermore maintain - this positive action.

"The Keychange network of female artists and industry professionals and the festival partners’ idea of establishing a collective pledge will significantly accelerate change,” says Vanessa Reed, CEO of the PRS Foundation. "I hope that this will be the start of a more balanced industry which will result in benefits for everyone.”

This new initiative comes as events in both North America and Europe continue to find ways to advance female talent in their festival line-ups. Just this year, the North Carolina festival Moogfest announced that its line-up would be led by all female, trans and non-binary talent while Sweden got the green light for Statement Festival - a 10,000 capacity "man-free" music event which is set to take place next summer.

Learn more about Keychange and their gender equality initiative here