Ideas, thoughts and opinions on our changing industry
It is a travesty that the cry to save the LIVE event industry isn’t louder, a war cry, a call to arms. It should be shouted from inner city rooftops, from distant mountains, it should bounce off the walls of homes and corporate businesses and valleys and canyons, it should be a guttural roar, a death rattle, that echoes in the souls of every living being who has ever witnessed or attended a live event. We urge you, fellow South Africans, our nation, to rail and rage against the dying of our light, let us not go gently into that good night. If our cry remains unheard our once proud, unifying voice will die, not with the bang we once delivered but with a whimper, a whimper barely heard above the battle cry of other industries deemed more important than ours. We are haemorrhaging: we, the Designers, Engineers and Technicians; we, the owners of staging companies, of theatres; venue managers, production managers, stage hands. Together with all the performing artists, we are the lifeblood of the LIVE event industry. We are gushing from the slashed wrists of a world that is failing us. We have no voice in the echelons of power. No one in higher office is campaigning for our survival. Without help, our lights, as they have done so sensitively and beautifully for years and years, will silently and smoothly fade to black for the very last time, their last hurrah, the red shift, mirroring the last drop of blood that triggers the very last beat of our hearts.