A conversation with my colleague Py from the Axean Festival got me thinking about this. We were trying to explain showcase festivals to someone who’d never been to one and kept hitting the same problem. The value doesn’t really translate until you’ve seen how it actually works.
My first was in 2014. I’d won the British Council’s Young Creative Entrepreneur Award, which came with a trip to The Great Escape in Brighton. I came home understanding something about the international music industry I hadn’t understood before — not the theory, but the actual mechanics of who knows whom and how things get decided.
I’ve been to about a dozen since. The people I met at those events are still part of how I work.
What a showcase festival is
The format is simple. Emerging artists play short sets — 20 to 30 minutes — for an audience that’s mostly music industry people: label executives, booking agents, managers, promoters, journalists. Artists don’t get paid. What they get is access to people who would otherwise be difficult to reach, and the chance to make a real impression face to face.
A regular festival is for the public. At a showcase festival, the performance is a pitch. There are also panels and conferences running alongside the stages — this is where a lot of the actual work happens, in the spaces between sessions.
The clearest argument for why this matters
At Zandari Festa in Seoul, I was in the audience for a panel featuring Martin Elbourne, who co-founded The Great Escape and books Glastonbury. Py asked him to name an artist who came out of the showcase circuit. Martin’s answer: “Adele is doing alright.“
Adele was a showcase artist before she was anything else. That’s the example I use now when someone asks whether these events actually do what they claim to do. It’s hard to argue with.
Festivals worth knowing
The ones that come up consistently:
Global:
- South by Southwest (SXSW), Austin — the largest in scope; covers music, film, and technology; draws industry people from across the world
- The Great Escape, Brighton — the main UK and European discovery festival, with an attached industry conference; I’ve been twice, in 2014 and 2016
- Reeperbahn Festival, Hamburg — roughly 475-500 concerts across 70 venues in four days, artists from over 40 countries
- Canadian Music Week, Toronto — the longest-running showcase festival, includes a conference and award show
Asia:
- Zandari Festa, Seoul — the best access to international industry contacts in Asia that I’ve found
- Music Matters, Singapore — part of the All That Matters event, with conferences alongside the showcases
- Axean Festival — regional focus on ASEAN artists
- Taiwan Beats, Taipei
- Tokyo International Music Market (TIMM) — focused on connecting Japanese artists to international markets
Why artists go
The access is the main thing. A booking agent who doesn’t respond to emails will watch you play and talk with you afterward. That’s genuinely different from any other way of getting in front of people.
For artists trying to enter new markets, international showcase festivals compress what would otherwise take months of separate trips into a few days. Industry delegates from multiple countries are in one place. You can have ten meaningful conversations in a week that might not have happened otherwise for years.
The panels are worth attending when they have working professionals talking through real problems. When they’re not that, you figure it out fast and use the time differently.
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