Aubyn Hill
THE AIR JAMAICA Jazz and Blues Festival has been a fixture on our calendar for the last four Januaries since we returned to live in Jamaica. All have been very enjoyable (although I had to spend most of last year's festival time in my hotel room because I had a bad bout of the flu), but this year has to be the most successful of all - for promoters and most fans. For the most part, the event was very well organised. All booths were elegantly decorated and (notwithstanding my past close association and present shareholding relationship with the National Commercial Bank - NCB) the New Orleans theme of the NCB booth was timely and elegantly constructed.
The live jazz music by Harold Davis & Friends between the appearances of the major jazz festival artistes was excellent and ensured that the NCB booth was fully patronised during the set changes. The Air Jamaica and Jamaica Tourist Board booth was the meeting place for political and business celebrities, and the food got better and better over the three nights of the event.
TOILET FACILITIES
A significant measure of the high quality of the organisation of the event was reflected in a most mundane facility - the toilets. Most everyone that I have heard commented very favourably on the organisation of the toilet facilities. They were extremely clean, very efficiently manned (actually womanned - since it was a group of uniformed and well organised ladies who directed the traffic flow for this most important activity).
The washing facilities were enhanced by just-in-time paper towels served by a gracious attendant, as well as mirrors and hand cream for those who needed those facilities. But the biggest measure of success has to be the huge crowds that attended. I am told that the crowd on Thursday evening was the largest for a first night in the history of the event.
On Saturday night they had to add additional speakers and screens near the NCB and Air Jamaica booths - at the farthest distance from the stage - to accommodate possibly the 30,000 attendees at the closing event that honoured Byron Lee for his fifty years of really outstanding service to the music industry in Jamaica.
Other notable successes were the performances of Shaggy (he came on too late), Richie Stephens and Maxi Priest - in the opinion of many who saw them. I thought that the performance of the flautist Nestor Torres, on the first evening, was a piece of sustained brilliance while Air Supply on the Friday evening gave the undoubted marquee performance. It was a most interesting sight to see dreadlocked Rastas singing along with the melodious tunes of the love songs of Air Supply - matching women word for word with a seamlessness that could only be labelled romantic.
Air Supply added a delectable touch by coming down from the stage and walking among the crowds - a move that must have caused serious trepidation on the part of the promoters and security personnel, but one that spoke volumes about the excellent behaviour of the thousands of fans. James Ingram was the big hit on Saturday night, the final night; although at some point, possibly due to a technology fault, it appeared as if his lips were out of sync with the music - at least on the screen farthest away from the stage.
IMPROVEMENTS, POTENTIAL RISKS
There was a general complaint that the band changes took far too long. When Shaggy is coming on at 3:00 o'clock in the morning you begin to wonder if it is worth waiting to see anyone until that time. There is a problem with parking. Many patrons complained that they had to wait two hours to get out of the VIP parking lot and a lady told me that she was very tired and decided to take a nap. It was one hour later that her car was allowed to move from the spot. When that happens, parking is a problem.
The promoters have to address that issue for future shows. Almost everyone that I talked with cited the lack of designated and clear pathways inside the crowd to be a major risk. The promoters will need to put in walkways that are cordoned off and delicately policed by security personnel to ensure that there are pathways for people to enter and leave and move around.
Many people who attended this year were extremely pleased that an event put on in Jamaica could be so successful to the tune of upwards of 30,000 people attending almost every night. Next to the admiration though was the not so subtle aversion to the risk of what happens if - for whatever reason - people decide that they have to move very quickly, en masse, from where they are to another location. Many fear, and do not want to contemplate, some of the dreaded consequences. The promoters will have to take the crowd size and the lack of passageways into serious consideration for next year.
LOCATION AND PRICE
The success of the event (a testimony to this is the very sustained large crowds over the three nights) leads to the immediate question whether or not the venue should be changed. Many of my friends were fairly adamant that the Cinnamon Hill Golf Club at Rose Hall, Montego Bay, is truly the ideal location for the event. Even the slope of the grounds - from the toilets to the stage - makes it an ideal location. But when you have too many people who want to get into a limited space the laws of economics take over and the pricing mechanism has to come into play.
When demand (people who want to attend the festival) is greater than supply (the space is limited) then the only fair arbiter has to be price. The price of the skybox (US$10,000 per box?) is already high so the next price that has to be addressed is the ticket price. The promoters will have to decide on the number of persons they will let into the grounds based on safety and profit considerations and then, given the strong demand for the nightly concert product, decide on an appropriate price that those who are privileged to attend will have to pay.
Naturally, if the promoters get too much out of sync with the market and the quality of their product should fall they will quickly find out that the laws of economics will work against them in that the supply of their concert tickets will far outweigh the demand for these tickets. The marketplace is a tight and delicately honed instrument and the promoters had better understand their economics as they seek to cater to patrons.
These music fans now see attendance as somewhat risky and who might well be willing to pay more for an excellent line-up of really talented artistes who will give consistently great performances - before 3:00 each morning. Maybe the promoter should make the decision that the top performers could come on before midnight and those who want to stay longer can stay to see the acts that will cater to more niche audiences. Packaging and differentiated pricing could do the trick.
I congratulate the promoters and sponsors, as well as the performers and the patrons for the excellent behaviour of all those who attended the 2006 Air Jamaica Jazz & Blues Festival last weekend at Rose Hall in Montego Bay.
Aubyn Hill is the CEO of Corporate Strategies Ltd., a restructuring and financial advisory firm. Respond to: writerhill@gmail.com.
