Music and Music Festivals as Change Drivers is a two-year initiative led by Roskilde Festival Group, running from 2024 to 2025 with activities in Denmark, Germany, the UK and the US.
Partly funded by the Danish Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Danish Arts Foundation, Music and Music Festival as Change Drivers (MMFCD) wants to see institutions being used as platforms for the arts, to talk about pressing global agendas such as climate change and mental well-being.
Throughout 2024 and 2025, the project, led by Roskilde Festival Group, has hosted various workshops, activities and symposiums to foster conversations about the potential and responsibility of using music and the festival’s unique community space as change drivers.
“We know that music festivals around the world – both large and small – are able to set agendas. They can do so because music festivals have a special ability to create social contexts with music and lyrics at the centre, where renewed life is given to the artists’ artistic repertoire,” says Signe Lopdrup, CEO of the Roskilde Festival Group. “This is where the real possibility for change lies. The artistic repertoire is a valuable asset because it is rooted in the artists’ own lives and practices, and in a variety of ways, it aims to make us reflect, talk to one another, and act. That’s why it’s important that we create a free and independent framework that allows space for a diversity of voices and expressions.”
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© Kim Matthäi Leland
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© Christian Hjorth
MMFCD and composer, musician, activist, and lead singer of AySay, Luna Ersahin, have created a campaign video highlighting how artists and their music can spark positive change, while festivals provide the platforms that bring together these artists to spread their message to a diverse audience.
Project partners include, among others, MXD, SPOT Festival, Dansk Live, Bird on the Wire (UK), Höme (DE), c/o pop (DE), All Things Go (US), and the Danish embassies in the UK, Germany, and the United States.
Watch the video above.