Earlier this month it was announced that the legendary Sound Relief concert series would return in March for their first concerts in over a decade, as a response to the ongoing bushfire crisis and a method of raising funds for relief services.
Today, organisers have taken to social media to announce the cancellation of the planned concerts saying that despite the outpouring of assistance from international and domestic artists, industry, media and suppliers, they don’t wish to stage the concerts “lightly”, and don’t believe that proceeding with them would produce the “impactful result that we believe these events can – and should – have.”
“We appreciate that there has been a huge amount of anticipation and desire from the public to support these concerts. In the past few months, we have seen fires, heartbreaking loss of life, ongoing drought, extreme storms, record temperatures, flooding and the devastation of our wildlife,” wrote organisers on Facebook.
“It is clear that there is no overnight fix for the issues our beautiful country is currently facing, and our discussions for any future event are subsequently shifting to restoration, recovery and prevention and a view to maximising results to best benefit these areas.”
The original Sound Relief was staged in 2009 to raise money for relief efforts for the February 2009 Victoria bushfires as well as flood victims in Queensland. The lineup included the likes of Taylor Swift, Coldplay, Kylie Minogue, Midnight Oil and Kings of Leon.
See the full statement from Sound Relief organisers below.
