Accessibility & Equity: Primavera Sound Case Study
- City & country: Barcelona, Spain
- Number of days: 5 on the main site, 7 for shows in venues around the city
- Site: Parc del Fòrum
- Daily capacity: 70,000
- Established in: 2001
- Keywords: Accessibility, inclusion of people with disabilities, (disadvantaged) youth, FLINTA*, gender balance, gender equality, LGBTQIA+ representation
By Marta Pallarès, Head of Press at Primavera Sound
Since 2001, Primavera Sound has been linked to Barcelona – with permission of its editions in Porto and Latin America – and championing values that are deeply rooted in the Mediterranean city such as modernity, warmth, open-mindedness and inclusion. In order to walk the walk, the festival has been working since then not only to programme a forward-thinking line-up, but also to programme better. To do better.
This can only be done by thinking globally, and working so no one feels left behind while enjoying their favourite artists: it doesn’t matter if you are rocking your outfit in a wheelchair, if you just turned 18 and got into the festival with a youth voucher, if you are a gender non-conforming individual expressing yourself freely or if you are visiting with a group of girls on your first festival trip.
Navigating Parc del Fòrum
Primavera Sound takes place in the Parc del Fòrum, a huge venue beside the Mediterranean Sea which is as characteristic as it is impressive, with its 132,000 m² of trafficable area. This is why the festival offers speedy access to the site for people with disabilities and individuals with special needs. They can enter through a lane where they will be given an extra wristband allowing them to access the viewing platforms reserved exclusively for them and their personal assistant. Each stage has one of these platforms. Moreover, their personal assistant will be given a free ticket when the disabled person can accredit the need of support from a third party.
The festival also offers concerts in an indoor venue with seats, the Auditori del Parc del Fòrum. There, people with disabilities and special needs have a reserved and adapted area, and they can use a lift to access this venue.
Obviously, the festival has wheelchair accessible toilets. Due to the size of the venue, there are also specific transfers for people with reduced mobility that run from the Plataforma Marina, where the two main stages are located, to the other side of the venue. Guiding dogs are allowed (and very much welcomed).
As a pilot test, in 2022, Primavera Sound offered two concerts which were accessible to people with hearing disabilities, through sign language interpretation, live subtitling, vibrating backpacks and an individual magnetic loop system. This was organized together with the foundation Music for All (Spanish), the Federation of Deaf People of Catalonia (FESOCA) and the Federation of Catalan Associations of Parents and Deaf People (ACCAPS).
Express yourself
Primavera Sound made headlines in 2019 due to its pioneering gender-balanced line-up: a success that proved that having as many FLINTA* as male artists on the poster wasn’t only possible, but necessary. After becoming the first major festival to achieve this goal, the Barcelona event pledged to keep this balance and continued delivering line-ups that are forward-thinking, diverse and filled with FLINTA* talent. That year, the festival became the first one to partner with the UN Sustainable Development Goals campaign, as one of its goals is gender balance.
But inclusivity refers to all sizes and genders, that’s why the festival developed a protocol called “Nobody is Normal” against sexual harassment, and in favour of all sexual, gender and bodily expressions. This “plan to promote sexual and gender freedoms” was created with lawyers, psychologists, specialists on sexual abuse, social workers and doctors, and it includes safer spaces, training for all the staff who can assess and act in case of any aggression, communication all over the venue and side screens, and patrols to give information and detect any possible misconduct against women, people from the LGBTQIA+ collective, or anyone who is not feeling safe. You can read all about it here.
La Fundació Primavera Sound for social inclusion
The festival has its own foundation, the Fundació Primavera Sound, which “generates opportunities for young people and contributes to social transformation through access to culture by providing opportunities for knowledge using music as a tool for personal and socio-community development through shared experiences.”
The foundation works with young people from the neighbouring area of Parc del Fòrum, where the festival is held, especially with those in risk of social exclusion, with a triple goal: “To awaken talent or interest in music, to consolidate personal autonomy, and add value to society from different angles, communicating that people can contribute in different ways apart from financial resources.”
One of the projects of the foundation is “Create your own music festival”, which started in 2022 with a pilot test held in a public high school and expanded in 2023 to three centres. Throughout the whole academic year, the students get lessons from professionals at Primavera on topics such as logistics, production, booking, and communication, so they will be able to create a music event at the end of the year. One of the projects gets selected and organised in real life.
The importance of young attendance is not only limited to the Besòs neighbourhood, though. In order to help young people to access the festival, Primavera Sound collaborates with the Spanish government and their campaign of “cultural voucher”: people turning 18 years old get a voucher to spend on books, cinema, music shows or, indeed, music festivals like Primavera. And up to the age of 14, the entry is free.