LET’S talk mixed messages, shall we? Last week the Edinburgh International Festival unveiled a strong-looking programme for this year’s Edinburgh International Festival – the 70th as it happens. A few days later the Edinburgh International Film Festival announced the UK premiere of the latest movie Cars 3. Any city that can boast both Pixar and PJ Harvey in the same summer must be doing something right.
Well up to a point, perhaps, because we have also heard in the last few days that St Bride’s Centre, after 12 years, will no longer be home to the Acoustic Music Centre at the Fringe this year after council chiefs raised the price of hiring the space five-fold.
Meanwhile, in the week it won an award for Best Cultural Event at the VisitScotland’s Thistle Awards, Unique Events learned they will no longer be producing the city’s Hogmanay festival after 24 years.
Unique, unsurprisingly, aren’t happy at the news and have said so. They did help launch the event back in 1993 after all. That said, sometimes change is a good thing and presumably The Underbelly will bring fresh ideas and a new approach to the event.
What is clear, though, is that they will have less money to do so, the council having opted to shave – or should that be slash – almost 20 per cent off the funding.
You could also point out a couple of other ongoing issues that suggest the value of art is under pressure in the capital. The recent news that the Electric Circus in Market Street is to close is just the latest in a sorry litany of venues that have disappeared from the city’s music scene in the last few years.
Yes, its closure will allow the Fruitmarket gallery next door to expand. But as one door opens another might close. In this case that might be the gallery at Inverleith House in the Royal Botanic Garden, the future of which still remains up in the air.
Inevitably, the infrastructure for the arts in any city is always going to be fluid, especially at the moment given the huge current pressures on council funding. But for a city that has built its worldwide reputation on the arts Edinburgh can’t afford to be cavalier in its commitment.
Musicians in particular have been vexed in recent years at the city council’s approach to live events over issues such as noise restriction and the loss of venues. It’s unfortunate given that Edinburgh’s music scene is particularly strong at the moment.
Unfortunate, too, that the news about the Acoustic Music Centre should emerge in the same week as Glasgow is hosting the BBC’s 6Music Festival, a celebration of the city’s musical history and thriving live music scene.
You can put an economic worth on the value of the arts to the city (according to Edinburgh 2015 Festivals Impact Survey, £313m for the festivals alone). But there is a more elusive value easily overlooked; the sense of a city that is alive and vibrant, a place worth visiting, worth living in because there are things to do, places to go, and live events to see. And not just twice a year.
Hopefully in the need to trim the financial sails Edinburgh doesn’t cut away the fabric of what makes it special.
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