By Mal Butler
John Giddings has been honoured with the ‘Festival Promoter of the Year’ award, at the FestForums ceremony, in Santa Barbara in California.
John, who has organised the IW festival since its revival in 2002, attended the celebrations in person, and received the award last Thursday (February 13) from Arthur Fogel, president of the Global Touring Division of Live Nation Entertainment, one of the world’s largest live entertainment companies.
Bringing some of the music industry’s biggest names to the Island has transformed the festival. Over the years, headline acts have included the Rolling Stones, The Who, Kasabian, Coldplay, The Police, David Bowie, Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney and Amy Winehouse.
As you can imagine, John is a busy man, but the IW Observer caught up with him – in Manila, in the Philippines, of all places!
John said: “I’m currently promoting The Corrs tour in Australia, and I’m heading back there now, having already stopped off at Bangkok via Santa Barbara.
“On the way, I had to leave The Corrs in Singapore on their own before heading off to America, so I’ve clocked up a lot of air miles and spent a lot of time asleep in the air!”
Looking back on the ceremony, he said: “It is fantastic for the industry and to be appreciated and received by an American audience was incredible.
“It was amazing to receive the award from Arthur, who I’ve known for many years. I have immense respect for Arthur, and it made it all the more meaningful.”
The headliners for this year’s event, taking place at Seaclose between June 19-22, include Justin Timberlake, Sting and Stereophonics, and plans are well in place for another musical extravaganza.
“We have already sold more than 45,000 tickets,” John added. “Everyone thinks the headliners are fantastic and there are more 10 to 15 artists to include in the line-up, which will be announced over the next few weeks, but they will be playing further down the bill. Now I’m praying for the weather.
“There will be a few more new ideas which we will be introducing over the weekend but I don’t want to say what they are too soon; it’s always nice to discover things at the festival itself.”
When we spoke before last year’s event, he said he had two headline acts already lined up for this year, but joked he would have to kill me if he told me. So I asked him who they actually were and he confessed it was Sting and Justin. I felt there was no point asking him who he had in mind for next year!
FestForums is North America’s premier festival industry conference, and brings together top industry leaders, innovators, and creatives. John was also one of the guest speakers at the event.
Isle of Wight Observer