Burlington Sound of Music Festival asks city for $750K to stay afloat

It’s Burlington’s The Sound of Music Festival’s “last resort” as organizers made their case Monday to the City of Burlington for financial support.

Staff from the annual music event asked, in front of a packed chamber, for nearly $750,000, otherwise the 45-year-old tradition may have to come to an end.

“Today I am respectfully asking you, on behalf of my team, to stick with a proven brand and be assured, we aren’t just putting on a music festival, we are building community,” said Brent Kinnaird with the Burlington Sound of Music Festival.

The Sound of Music Festival’s finances are in the red, and on Monday its organizers made their plea to the city, in order for the show to go on.

“For anyone to suggest you can simply replace what we’ve built is offensive, and disrespectful to our team,” said Kinnaird.

Last month, organizers laid out a large financial request to the City of Burlington: loan forgiveness to the tune of $225,000; another$22,000 for unpaid bills from past festivals; a one-time grant of $200,000 to pay off local vendors who are still owed from last year, and another $350,000 next January, and each year thereafter.

“That’s three-quarters of $1 million, $750,000 just for one year,” said Marianne Meed Ward, the Mayor of Burlington.

Organizers cited a downturn in alcohol sales, meagre donations from visitors and a 50/50 raffle that had “limited success.”

Now, with the major financial ask, they’re also proposing some tweaks to the festival to try and keep things afloat.

One stage instead of three, three days instead of four, and a $5 entry fee, to list just a few of those changes.

“Can you provide a free festival for the typical $150,000 that the city offers?” asked Ward.

“I think that would be an incredible challenge for us,” said Kinnaird.

“Going forward, if the city decides it’s going to be an unpaid festival, then we’ll work with them on that,” said Dave Shepherd, who is on the Board of Directors for the Sound of Musical Festival.

We know they do it with ribfest — ribfest is a paid fest, so they’ve set the tone with that — so I think if we can do something similar, we’re happy to deal with whatever. We just want the chance to speak with the city and have open dialogue with them.”

Other free festivals of similar scope, like Hamilton’s Supercrawl, say their plans focus on remaining under budget, and ahead of schedule.

“We do all the grant applications, we budget low, and hopefully we get more than we’re applying for, but we always pick a low budget number on the grants,” said Tim Potocic, the organizer of Supercrawl. “If you’re counting on robust beer sales at a festival, like if you’re counting on it being multiple six figures, maybe you shouldn’t be counting on that in your budget.”

For long-term volunteers, the thought of seeing the Sound of Music Festival disappear, stings.

“It’s a sad thing for Burlington,” said Scott Johnson, who volunteers at the Sound of Music Festival. “It’s been a huge part of my children’s [life] growing up, and it would be a huge loss to the community in Burlington.”

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