Article by: Ryan Hood
The music industry was among the hardest hit industries during the pandemic. We’ve seen the closure of iconic music venues, and artists struggling to get by without the income from live events. As the Delta variant surges, many promotional companies are stepping up and requiring proof of vaccination from attendees upon arriving at their events. Among them is entertainment giant AEG Presents, one of the premier event owners and operators in the country.
By no later than October 1, all those attending AEG events, festivals, and concerts will be required to show proof of vaccination before entering. AEG Presents has partial or full ownership of festivals such as Electric Forest, Firefly Music Festival, Day N Vegas, and Coachella, as well as iconic music venues like New York’s Webster Hall and Los Angeles’s El Rey Theatre and The Roxy. Numerous independent venues and smaller promotional companies have set vaccination requirements too, but AEG Presents might be the single biggest entity to put such a requirement in place.
LiveNation followed suit and announced on Friday, August 13 that it would start requiring attendees of its events to show proof of vaccination beginning in early October. The media giant implemented a similar policy for Lollapalooza last month, which has resulted in only 203 recorded cases of COVID-19 linked to the festival. LiveNation is also a significant stakeholder in Insomniac Events, which announced last week that its Beyond Wonderland festival will require attendees to show proof of vaccination upon entry. This will be Insomniac’s third major festival following the pandemic shutdown and will be its first to require proof of vaccination or a negative test.
It remains to be seen how long these vaccination mandates will be in place. They may also set a precedent for other events and event promoters going forward, as the industry does its best to prevent a complete shutdown reminiscent of early 2020.
We will have more updates about festival vaccination requirements as they are announced, so stay tuned into Moon Lvnding for dance music coverage that’s out of this world.
