{"id":2184721,"date":"2025-12-02T22:54:28","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:54:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2184721"},"modified":"2025-12-02T22:54:28","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T22:54:28","slug":"cranbrook-cancels-2026-rock-the-kootenays-music-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/cranbrook-cancels-2026-rock-the-kootenays-music-festival\/","title":{"rendered":"Cranbrook cancels 2026 Rock the Kootenays music festival"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"ttsIcon-cIBsl\"><\/div>\n<div>\n<p>Listen to this article<\/p>\n<p>Estimated 3 minutes<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"toggletip-tKLKF ttsToggleTip-DSCNQ\"><button type=\"button\" class=\"toggletipInfoButton-yoX4E\" aria-label=\"More information\" aria-controls=\":R89qnl:\" aria-describedby=\":R89qnl:\" aria-expanded=\"false\"><svg width=\"24\" height=\"24\" viewbox=\"0 0 24 24\" focusable=\"false\" aria-hidden=\"true\"><path d=\"M11 7H13V9H11V7ZM11 11H13V17H11V11ZM12 2C6.48 2 2 6.48 2 12C2 17.52 6.48 22 12 22C17.52 22 22 17.52 22 12C22 6.48 17.52 2 12 2ZM12 20C7.59 20 4 16.41 4 12C4 7.59 7.59 4 12 4C16.41 4 20 7.59 20 12C20 16.41 16.41 20 12 20Z\" fill=\"black\"\/><\/svg><\/button><\/p>\n<p>The audio version of this article is generated by text-to-speech, a technology based on artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p>The City of Cranbrook has cancelled the city-sponsored Rock the Kootenays music festival, which was scheduled for August 2026.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith economic uncertainty looming in the year ahead, and the loss of just over $14,000 from Rock the Kootenays 2025, Council decided it is not willing to further risk taxpayer dollars for a 2026 event,\u201d the city wrote in a <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/cranbrook.ca\/news\/council-makes-difficult-decision-to-cancel-rock-the-kootenays-for-2026\" target=\"_blank\">statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>City council blamed last year\u2019s loss on \u201cdeclining ticket sales and lower attendance at large music festivals across the industry overall.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>Festival lineups have included Canadian rock stalwarts such as Tom Cochrane, Honeymoon Suite, Colin James, 54-40, Men Without Hats and April Wine. <\/p>\n<p>News of the cancellation generated over 200 responses on a Cranbrook community <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/groups\/2346978825\/permalink\/10164305445033826\/\" target=\"_blank\">Facebook page<\/a> within hours, prompting\u00a0surprise and suggestions to improve the event.\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>The three-day music festival was launched in 2023, in the wake of the pandemic. It made more than $200,000 in direct profit in its first two years, the city said, before incurring a loss this year. <\/p>\n<p>Cranbrook\u2019s economic development office <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.choosecranbrook.ca\/rocking-the-kootenays\/\u00a0\" target=\"_blank\">reported <\/a>some 10,000 people attended the 2024 festival, with 70 per cent of the crowd travelling to the Western Financial Place grounds from outside communities.\u00a0  <\/p>\n<h2>Festivals across B.C. face pressure<\/h2>\n<p>Julie Fowler, executive director of the B.C. Music Festival Collective (BCMFC), says events like Rock the Kootenays\u00a0face a rocky future. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWell, unfortunately it&#8217;s not totally surprising because we are seeing festivals across the province cancel,\u201d Fowler said. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe margins were always very narrow. And now just with the rising cost of everything and funding being less \u2026 it&#8217;s a challenging environment out there for festivals.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>In 2021, the province established the\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www2.gov.bc.ca\/gov\/content\/tourism-immigration\/tourism-resources\/tourism-funding-programs\/fairs-festivals-events-fund#about\" target=\"_blank\">B.C. Fairs, Festivals and Events Fund <\/a>to help events restart after pandemic restrictions. It<!-- --> distributed\u00a0$80 million to more than 3,000 events in 184 communities. It  has not been renewed since its last application process closed in 2024.<\/p>\n<p>The Ministry of Tourism currently provides $5 million in annual funding to the entire event industry in B.C. <\/p>\n<p>Fowler argues event funding, from any level of government, pays off in the end.\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe know that with every dollar that&#8217;s invested in arts and culture &#8230; the return is something like $2.39 back into the economy,\u201d she said.\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>The BCMFC&#8217;s survey of 51 of its 115\u00a0members suggests music festivals in B.C. generate $550 million in economic activity annually.\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>The City of Cranbrook, meanwhile, hasn\u2019t formally ruled out any revival or replacement, stating council \u201clooks forward to other potential opportunities for concerts and events like this in the future.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.cbc.ca \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Listen to this article Estimated 3 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by text-to-speech, a technology based on artificial intelligence. The City of Cranbrook has cancelled the city-sponsored Rock the Kootenays music festival, which was scheduled for August 2026. \u201cWith economic uncertainty looming in the year ahead, and the loss of just [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2184722,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2184721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Cranbrook-cancels-2026-Rock-the-Kootenays-music-festival.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2184721"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2184723,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2184721\/revisions\/2184723"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2184722"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2184721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2184721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2184721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}