Eavis also stressed the importance of the festival’s occasional fallow years.
With the Glastonbury festival fast approaching for 2024, organiser Emily Eavis has confirmed that a fallow year looks likely to take place in 2026.
Eavis confirmed the news on the BBC’s Sidetracked podcast, when speaking with Annie Mac and Nick Grimshaw, after admitting that no acts are yet locked in for next year, but that an idea for the line-up is taking shape.
She said: “I have a kind of vague idea in my head of who is gonna be doing it this year. And then we might do a fallow year after that. We are due a fallow year. The fallow year is important because it gives the land a rest, and it gives the cows a chance to stay out for longer and reclaim their land.
“I think it’s important, I think it gives everybody time to just switch off and the public as well. It is a lot, isn’t it? Then you kind of go away for a bit and it feels lovely when you come back. And I think it’s quite good not [to] seem to be cashing in.”
The festival has been known to take fallow years off periodically, with the last official one in 2018, although the 2020 and 2021 festivals were cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
During the podcast, Eavis also explained that her parents almost closed the festival for good in the 1990s, but that after her her mother Jean died her father said: “Oh, I think I might need the festival now.”
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She continued: “They were going to retire and go on long cruises and things like that. My dad was like, ‘Listen, let’s keep it going.’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I’ll help you’. Never did I think I’d still be here a few decades on.”
This year’s festival line-up is led by Dua Lipa, Coldplay and SZA, while Little Simz, Keane and Cindy Lauper are among the other acts taking to the Pyramid Stage.
Last year’s performance by Elton John broke BBC records for Glastonbury, with 7.6 million viewers tuning in.
Glastonbury Festival will take place from 26th until 30th June 2023 at Worthy Farm, Pilton, Somerset. Looking for something on TV tonight?
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