MADRID (CelebrityAccess) — Organizers for the Primavera Sound festival brand revealed that the event will not be returning to Madrid next year after losing the first day of the 2023 edition of the festival to dangerous weather.
The Madrid edition of the festival, which debuted this June at Ciudad del Rock in Arganda Del Rey, did not live up to the expectation of the Primavera Sound team.
Along with the weather, event organizers cited logistical challenges and noted that they were unable to secure an appropriate venue for the event in 2024.
In a statement published on Friday, organizers for the event said:
After the recent editions of Primavera Sound in Barcelona, Madrid and Porto and thanks to your comments and the detailed assessment we have carried out, we can say that we are sure: the festival that you want and the festival that we want are more and more in sync with each other. After the pandemic and the exceptional double edition of 2022, this return to (new) normality has reaffirmed our idea of what a Primavera Sound festival should be like wherever it is held. The outstanding events in Barcelona and Porto have embodied this idea and show us the way: reconnecting with the essence of the festival and combining the undeniable artistic uniqueness with world-class pull and an experience of maximum comfort for the attendees. It is not an easy balance, but it is the balance we want and the one we have managed to achieve.
For this reason, and after several weeks of exhaustive evaluation of the first edition of Primavera Sound Madrid, the present circumstances lead us to announce that in 2024 the festival will not be able to take place. Although both the city of Madrid and the whole region welcomed us with open arms, with a warmth that was mirrored in the institutions, the cultural agents and of course the audience, the external difficulties that the festival had to face in the final stretch of the pre-production gave rise to one of the most complicated events that Primavera Sound has ever had to face. And today, in the run-up to 2024, the city does not have a site able to host an event of this magnitude and format in terms of audience demands, production requirements and musical show.
“As a consequence, although the evaluation of the festival was more than satisfactory on a musical level, the expectations we had were not fulfilled and the experience of the festivalgoers due to several logistical aspects was not the desired one. Inside the Ciudad del Rock we experienced a festival full of great musical moments, but we are not oblivious to the annoyances”, said Almudena Heredero, director of Primavera Sound Madrid. “And that leads us to understand that, now, the conditions are not right for Madrid to have a Primavera Sound as it deserves in 2024”.
“We will continue to study the possibility of holding a Primavera Sound in Madrid because we are maintaining a continuous and constructive dialogue with the institutions of the city. The determination to continue this relationship by all the parties involved exists, and the relationship with the city, which has existed for a long time, has only grown closer over the last few months. The thing is that, right now, there are no guarantees that it will be possible to organize a festival in 2024 that meets the quality standards that Primavera Sound is used to offering. It has been a first edition from which we have learned many lessons and we don’t want to ignore them for the future,” added Primavera Sound Director Alfonso Lanza.
