So I sent my interview questions to the people who agreed to do interviews and am now just waiting for them to send them back. I got one back yesterday from this lovely lady who works in the Sonoma County Film department and she was gracious enough to answer questions about local festivals as well as the process for obtaining permits/permission to film in the area and stage events. Hopefully I’ll get at least two more within the next week or so …!
I also got my press credentials for the Sonoma International Film Festival, and will be attending this Saturday. Pretty excited about that! I’ll get to see a large-scale film festival event complete with after parties and special events such as panels and signings. I haven’t been to this festival so it will be a treat.
My website is all set up and is simply awaiting content. I’ll be tackling my timelines probably next week.
Not much else to report. I’ve been keeping up with my readings and am enjoying the music festival articles. Some notes I’ve taken (mostly for my own reference):
Branding, Sponsorship and Music Festivals:
- sponsorship as a vital income stream
- secure headliner acts to ensure ticket sales
- loss of sponsorship is one reason why many festivals fail
- countercultural carnivalesque
- utopian possibilities, freedom from social norms and expectations, to play, transform, or create new norms.
- commercialization and sponsorship are negatively linked to other trends such as the increasing regulation, standardization and domestication
- majority of festivals make use of sponsorship opportunities in order to provide financial support, additional attractions, and assistance in marketing, promo and media coverage.
- grants, donations, private organizations/individuals,
- gaining access to certain target markets
- association of “good times’
- captive festival audience – making a profit
- leveraging – badging – logo placement
- alcohol sponsorships
- playful, imaginative and memorable multi-sensory experiences associated with the sponsor
- partners vs sponsorships
- ideological or ethical decisions about which sponsors to work with
- ex: sustainability
- the right “fit”
- avoidance – without sponsorship support
- music festivals as consumer commodities and spectacles vs countercultural carnivalesque
- not real but treated as real (hyperreal)
- “shallow and manipulative forms of experience that leave little room for truly participatory activity.
- activities and settings staged for the benefit of the sponsors
- passive vs active festival-goers
- financial pressures in promoting festivals
- brand acceptance/avoidance
- “something for everyone”
Blues Festivals:
- House of Blues: study in contrast and irony
- mostly white clientele
- “look” joints, bbq shacks
- decentralized nature of blues tourism
- territoriality
- cultural tourism – Blues festivals serve as one means to promote the blues as part of Mississippi’s cultural heritage.
- “sanitize and repackage” the community in order to attract tourists to the area
- disappearance of “local color’
- blues festivals: homecoming/honoring musicians, preservation of blues culture, and integration/racial harmony
- “vanishing blues culture”
- abandonment of earlier styles
- a “temporary integrated” community
- Black Codes
- blues as a response to oppressive and violent environments
- Blues festivals funded by corporate sponsors, local businesses, individual contributors
- providing financial assistance to elderly, often destitute blues musicians
- Most audience members still arrive as a member of their respective racially segregated group. While whites and blacks may spark up conversations or even dance together, audience members are still closely connected to their primary group.
- In many ways, racial integration at blues festivals is limited to spectators simply occupying the same physical space
And that’s my blog for the week! 
