The summer festival season is winding down in the United States, but some of the nation’s top destination events have already announced event dates for 2011.
The Empire Polo Club in Indio, CA, will once again host its annual duo of events. Fans can celebrate a dozen years of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival over the April 15-17 weekend, while the Stagecoach Country Music Festival marks its fifth year later on April 30-May 1.
Elsewhere in the nation, the long-running Lollapalooza just wrapped its 2010 season a couple weekends ago, but it also has unveiled 2011 event dates. The festival will return August 5-7 for a seventh year at Grant Park in Chicago, IL.
During the recent 2010 festival season, the three-day Coachella drew an estimated 75,000 people per day, while the two-day Stagecoach attracted over 50,000 people per day, according to reports by the Los Angeles Times. Those numbers are up substantially from 2009 when Stagecoach drew 40,000 attendees per day, and Coachella saw 160,000 attendees overall (an average of 53,000-plus people per day).
Jay-Z, Muse and Gorillaz headlined Coachella 2010. Some of Stagecoach’s main draws included Keith Urban, Toby Keith, Sugarland and retiring duo Brooks & Dunn.
Lollapalooza also saw considerable growth this year — drawing about 80,000 people per day compared to 2009’s daily average of 75,000, according to the Chicago Tribune. Lady Gaga, Green Day, and Soundgarden headlined the 2010 main stage, while a second stage featured overlapping sets by much-hyped acts like The Strokes, Phoenix and Arcade Fire.
Despite the rise in attendance across the board, Coachella, for one, is not aiming to increase its numbers again in 2011. After overcrowding issues this past year prompted complaints from concert-goers and critics alike, officials for the festival have sworn to decrease ticket sales for 2011.
“It’s been a hundred days now since the show, and we’ve been writing notes down [about] how to make this show better,” said Paul Tollett, president of Coachella promoter Goldenvoice, in an interview with LA Weekly. “Almost across the board, each one of us came up with the same note: less people.”
How that decision will ultimately impact the festival’s ticket sales and availability remains to be seen. Ticketing information and artist lineups have not yet been announced for any of the three festivals. When available, updates will be made on the respective Web sites for Coachella, Stagecoach and Lollapalooza.
