Guelph musicians Alanna Gurr and Charlotte Moore were frustrated with what they perceived as a testosterone-fueled music festival scene so they decided to fan their own exclusively female flame and start the Holy Smokes Music Festival.
“We are friends and co-workers and we are both musicians and we have talked a lot about our experiences as women-identifying musicians and the lack of representation sometimes on festival lineups,” said Gurr. “We’ve always kind of been like, oh man we could do a better job. So, one day we decided we should just do it.”
They decided if they were going to commit to the concept and turn things around it couldn’t be a half measure. They had to go all in.
“Let’s see if we could have a line up of all women and defined non-binary folks,” said Gurr. “We decided we wanted to have all women as sound people and venue owners as well – so, venues that are owned by women.”
They put out a call for musicians and waited for a response.
“We weren’t really sure how many applications we would get or what the interest would be but we were really pleasantly surprised that we got a lot of really high quality musicians,” said Moore. “They not only want to play but want to support what we are doing. So, that was really encouraging.”
They reached out to like-minded folks in the Big Smoke for Holy Smoke applicants.
“There’s a closed group on Facebook of Toronto women in music and I sent out the call there and that was a big push,” said Gurr. “A lot of people came from that kind of pool. It’s just a really good networking group. We told them this is what we’re doing and if they’re interested they had two weeks to send us their stuff.”
More than 60 artists from as far afield as Montreal answered the call but not everyone who applied fit the bill. .
“We definitely learned a lot because there were a lot of really great artists but you have to think about who they are playing with to create the bill,” said Gurr. “Some people were really great but they just didn’t fit with the lineup. So, that was a bit of a learning element for me.”
Moore plays cello as the female half of the Guelph duo The Waverlys and Gurr plays and records with her band Alanna Gurr and the Greatest State but they won’t be performing in the festival.
“It would be great if we could play but it’s our first year and we really want to do it right,” said Moore. “I think we will be running around a lot and we wanted to create space for others to play.”
They have deliberately limited the gender criteria for anyone wanting to play the Holy Smokes Music Festival but they aren’t the only promoters pushing for higher and fairer representation of artists who identify as women at festivals.
“There was recently the Key Change Initiative where festivals were asked to sign on to this movement to have 50 per cent female identifying musicians and 50 per cent male identifying musicians in their lineup,” said Gurr. “They were asked to do it by 2022.”
Gurr said promoters at Riverfest and Hillside Festival signed on but a number of other large festival promoters wouldn’t.
“They said they couldn’t do it,” said Gurr. “They said it wasn’t feasible. We spoke about that and it was an interesting moment for us.”
Moore and Gurr are grateful for the guidance and support they’ve received from Hillside Festival and Kazoofest promoters as well as others in the community.
“We did get a lot of funding, help and sponsorship from the Downtown Business Association so, all of the daytime programming is free or pay what you can,” said Gurr.
“The two evening shows are ticketed and the final after party is a fundraiser for Girls Rock Camp.”
For more information on tickets, venues and a full list of performances visit www.holysmokesmusicfest.com.