I’ve been thinking about writing about Together Fest SF ever since I heard about it through a collective I’m a part of. A couple members of said collective were slated to perform and were abuzz with excitement about being a part of a lineup made up entirely of women.
I was excited too! There’s a blatant absence of women in festival lineups and Together Fest SF was something that sought to push the conversation through something actionable — creating a music festival by and for women. Women were not only scheduled to perform but they were booked to work every aspect of the event  — from the performers we see on the event flyers to the army of folks working behind the scenes to ensure everyone has a bomb ass time.
It took me a while to cement the angle that I’d develop in writing the piece and today I told myself I was ready to put pen to paper about why an all women’s lineup was so important for music, for the Industry, for women. I had a vision of being #articulate but it all went down the rabbit hole when I popped up the event site to find that Together Fest SF was rescheduled to 2017.
Event organizers shared a statement which read:
Due to an issue with our sound system, we have to reschedule Together Fest. The SF Armory is a unique space — a one hundred-year-old Moorish castle in the middle of a bustling neighborhood. Unfortunately, the custom sound system that was supposed to debut with Together Fest has been delayed, and the existing system would have had to be dramatically impacted in order to minimize sound leakage in the surrounding neighborhood. As much as it saddens us to move it, we didn’t think it fair to produce such an important show with subpar sound.
We’re overwhelmed by everyone’s enthusiasm for this event, and are excited to see you all next year. Follow us on our social pages and join our email list below to be the first to know about the new date.
-SF Armory, Ms. Jackson, Audrey Joseph
Reading the statement left me with a heavy heart. I saw and read about the buzz that the event generated and was excited to see what kind of ripple effect this would have on music communities, especially the women taking space in those communities. There was a lot of hope tied to the event, one entwined with the expectation that should-this-go-well-this-could-be-huge. My head swirled at the potentiality of the music industry changing.
It’s disappointing that we’re going to have to wait until 2017 for an all women’s electronic music festival to be actualized. More than anything this is a reflection of what’s at the root of the issue of women’s representation in music: it’s structural and sure as hell about access to resources (like a functional sound system) and opportunities (like Together Fest SF).
Ms. Jackson and Audrey Jackson made the tough call to postpone Together Fest SF to 2017. Disappointments aside, the silver lining in this is that the Together Fest SF was postponed and not cancelled. Call me corny, call me excessively and annoyingly hopeful, but in this day and age, it’s what gets me through.
Until then, I’ll be wishin’ and hopin’ for 2017 to come a little bit sooner.
