San Diego County, California – The Wonderfront Music and Arts Festival said to deliver a star-studded lineup of musical arts this fall to the San Diego bay waterfront, has been announced postponed on Thursday due to the high number of COVID-19 cases in California and across the country.
According to a joint statement from Wonderlust Events, LLC and the Port of San Diego, this year’s event was put off after “weeks of discussions and research” with the county, state, and national public health officials regarding this fall’s expected COVID-19 case numbers.
Outdoor Events Postponed
Considered “superspreader events” like outdoor music festivals, concerts, and events, where many people gather at the risk of neglecting social distancing and other COVID-19 protocols, have slowly been declared canceled or otherwise being reviewed upon by authorities.
“The continued safety of the community had to be front and center in our decision making,” said Michael G. Brown, Port of San Diego’s vice president of marketing and communications.
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“We pushed as long as we could working with the Wonderfront Festival team to see if case trends might look more positive or new information would give us the comfort level needed to move forward. But at the end of the day, the situation has not improved. Knowing that people book advance to travel to attend, and production crews have months of logistical planning to do, a final decision needed to be made,” he added.
The committee is now looking to make the festival happen on November 20, 2022. Organizers said more information will soon be available “in the upcoming weeks” regarding next year’s festival.
“This announcement, though challenging, is met with understanding and appreciation for the Port of San Diego for providing us with such a spectacular venue for our festival,” said Paul Thornton, Managing Partner of Wonderlust Events, LLC.
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“We love our lineup, including major headliners who confirmed this year, and the Wonderfront team has been tirelessly working on the festival’s second year. We have some new fan experiences we were so excited to roll out. Our team completely understands the Port of San Diego’s decision, as the safety of the Wonderfront community must come first. Once again, we will pivot and work with our artists to push this lineup to our new 2022 dates. We’re hoping to finalize the new dates so we can announce them and put tickets on sale this Fall. We are looking forward to building an even better experience and celebrating the world getting back together at Wonderfront 2022,” he added.
This year’s postponement marks the second time the COVID-19 pandemic has put the festival on hold. The inaugural festival in 2019 featured more than 125 artists over three days and drew more than 57,000 people.
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