Cancelled: Coachella and Stagecoach look for new dates
Popular springtime music festivals Coachella and Stagecoach are on the hunt for new dates after their April dates were cancelled. The Hollywood Reporter broke the news on Friday afternoon and there is no word on future dates or plans to reschedule.
Coachella and Stagecoach missed the entire 2020 season after their springtime dates were pushed to October in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. It wasn’t long before the events were cancelled entirely, marking the first time since 2001 that Coachella did not take place at all.
Many events postponed from 2020 to 2021 are already being pushed back to later in the year, and even into 2022, as uncertainty around safety makes planning and event logistics a literal nightmare.
The 2020 lineup at Coachella was supposed to include performers like Travis Scott and Rage Against the Machine. Fans numbering in the hundreds of thousands flock to the Empire Polo Club in California’s Coachella Valley for the annual music festival, but Riverside health authorities are concerned that bringing that many people together in April would be a very bad idea.
Due to the pandemic, Public Health Officer Dr. Cameron Kaiser today (Jan. 29) signed a public health order canceling Coachella Valley Music and Arts, Stagecoach Country Music festivals planned for April 2021. We look forward to when the events may return. https://t.co/YAIn8uTea9
— Dr. Geoffrey Leung (@RivCoDoc) January 29, 2021
When Will Coachella And Stagecoach Take Place in 2021?
The biggest question hanging in the air right now is how long COVID-19 cases will continue to tax an already overburdened hospital system. With vaccine rollout moving slower than anticipated, there’s no way to gauge when it will be safe enough to bring people together for a massive event like these outdoor music festivals.
While Coachella is an outdoor music festival, people camp on festival grounds and the proximity could lead to an accidental outbreak. Even if they operated at 25% capacity it would still be a lot of people spending way too much time in close proximity and that’s a risk that can’t be taken right now.
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It’s hard to imagine where things will be in the coming months. Coachella and Stagecoach could try to push for a fall date, but if the pattern holds they might announce that they will skip 2021 entirely and focus on a big April 2022 return.