Festival representatives had an appointment this Tuesday afternoon at the Ministry of Culture to clarify the horizon for the summer of 2024, where the organization of the Paris Olympic Games risks impacting several events, forced to shift their dates. , or even to cancel.
Worried since Gérald Darmanin's statements about the impossibility for the police to cover large gatherings between mid-July and the end of August, particularly in the Paris region, the representatives of the main cultural event organizations (Prodiss, Current Music Union, France Festivals, etc. met Rima Abdul-Malak for two hours.
Read alsoThe threat of the 2024 Olympics still hangs over summer festivals: “Some would not recover”
The remarks of the Minister of Culture on their maintenance during the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, in an interview granted to Le Parisien in mid-December, as well as the distribution on December 13 of a circular to the prefects, relating to the security of events cultural and sports of the summer of 2024, signed by the Interior, Culture and Sports, had not completely extinguished the concerns.
A few hours before their meeting on Tuesday, several unions and festival bosses still expressed their questions to us.
"We had a working meeting with around forty festivals at the Transmusicales in Rennes in December and they are unanimous: after two blank years linked to the health crisis, in 2020 and 2021, a new cancellation would not be bearable", reminded us Aurélie Hannedouche, the director of the Union of contemporary music (SMA).
“No festival is in the situation of having to cancel”
The Minister of Culture recalled the framework of the circular sent to the prefects: only festivals mobilizing mobile force units (known as "UFM", for CRS companies or gendarmerie squadrons) during the Olympic Games (from July 18 to August 11, 2024) and the Paralympic Games (August 24 to September 8, 2024) are affected by date or format adjustments.
“Out of the fifteen festivals concerned in these two periods and which mobilize UFMs, solutions have already been found for most of these events, with the exception of Lollapalooza, in the ParisLongchamp racecourse
(16th century)
and Rock en Seine, in Saint-Cloud
(Hauts-de-Seine)
, for whom the work continues to find solutions, ”comments the cabinet of Rima Abdul-Malak.
“The Minister expressed her astonishment when she read in the press that certain professional organizations mentioned the figure of 2,600 festivals affected by cancellations, whereas this figure is not based on any evaluation and the circular specifies the opposite.
To date, no festival is in the situation of having to cancel: those who do not mobilize mobile force units are intended to hold.
Reconciling cultural and sporting life during this period is the objective set by the ministers to the prefects.
»
"Only oral promises, not written"
The boss of the SMA, which represents some 200 festivals, left the meeting "reassured".
“The minister has really taken the measure of the problem and the ministry has done a great job, reacts Aurélie Hannedouche.
The Minister tells us that there is no longer any subject, that she has contacted most of the prefects and that very few festivals are still concerned.
But we will still remain vigilant until 2024, because there are only oral promises, not written ones.
We will also meet every three months with the minister's team to take stock of each file.
»
Read alsoFestivals during the Olympic Games: organizers and communities seek solutions to avoid cancellations
“The exchanges were constructive and reassuring, also believes Malika Seguineau, general manager of Prodiss
(National Union of Musical and Variety Shows)
, which brings together the biggest events and the largest performance halls.
We now have a framework – with the circular sent to the prefects – and a very clear line from the minister, who refuses to talk about cancellation, but we do not yet have any firm decisions.
We hope for perfect visibility at the end of this first quarter and stable decisions until 2024.”
Malika Seguineau would also like to point out that "the Paris Olympics will nevertheless have an impact on the music sector, since there will be no concerts in the stadiums, nor in Paris La Défense Arena and the Accor Arena. during the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
It will be a big loss.
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