Music Festival timeline

  • Glastonbury 1970 - The Inaugural Festival

    The first Festival was held on the day after Jimi Hendrix died, over a two day period and before long “word had got around”. It was the Blues... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1971

    The Festival moved to the time of the Summer Solstice and was known as the "Glastonbury Fayre". It had been planned by Andrew Kerr and Arabella... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1978

    This became known as the “impromptu” Festival. This happened with the arrival of travellers washed out from Stonehenge who were led to believe that... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1979

    Now a three day event and was still referred to as the Glastonbury Fayre but with the theme of “the year of the child”. Bill Harkin and Arabella... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1981

    The name was changed to Glastonbury Festival and Michael Eavis took the helm running the event again. This was the first “Campaign for Nuclear... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1982

    Again, there was CND involvement and it was this year that Western Region CND took control of the entrance gates and Mid Somerset CND took... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1983

    1983 called for a licence to be obtained for the event since the introduction of the local Government Act became law, giving local authorities the... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1984

    In January 1984 Michael Eavis successfully defended 5 prosecutions bought against him by Mendip District Council alleging contravention of the... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1985

    By 1985 Worthy farm was considered too small to accommodate the Festival so the neighbouring Cockmill farm land was purchased to enlarge the... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1986

    Again, this was a bigger Festival than the preceding year’s event. Due to the growth there were additions to the farm office, communications,... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1987

    The council’s decision to refuse the licence was overturned in court only in May. 1987 saw the introduction of the Womad stage to the Festival.... Read more

  • Monsters of Rock 1988

    1988 was the biggest ever Donington,107,000 turned up. Given dry conditions that would not have been a problem, however, the festival was marred by... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1989

    Again there were once again complications with the local council over the granting of the Festival licence. The Police were bought into the... Read more

  • Moscow Music Peace Festival

    The Moscow Music Peace Festival was a one-time gathering of high-profile hard rock acts for a performance in Moscow, Soviet Union on 12 and 13... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1990 - The 20th Anniversary

    The festival took the name of the Glastonbury Festival for Contemporary Performing Arts for the first time, to reflect the diversity of... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1992

    This was the first year that the donations from the profits of the Festival were made to Greenpeace and Oxfam. Michael Eavis felt that with... Read more

  • The first annual KROQ Weenie Roast takes place

    Weenie Roast is a multi-artist alternative rock concert, presented annually in June by the Los Angeles, California, USA radio station KROQ. Since... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1993

    The Festival continued to go from strength to strength as it began to get into its stride as a successful and increasingly popular event. The... Read more

  • The second annual KROQ Weenie Roast takes place

    The second annual Weenie Roast, hosted by the legendary L.A. rock radio station KROQ (106.7FM), took place on Saturday, June 11, 1994 at Irvine... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1994

    On 13 June 1994 the famous Pyramid stage burnt down in the early hours of the morning but luckily a replacement was provided by the local company... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1995 - The 25th Anniversary

    The 25th anniversary of the first Festival was celebrated and saw the return of the two performers from the first event - Keith Christmas and Al... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1997

    Torrential rain just before the weekend resulted in this being the “Year of the Mud”. Undeterred, festival-goers boogied in their boots to more... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1998

    Rain again turned parts of the site into a brown quagmire, but resilient campers still enjoyed the evergreen mix of entertainment and all night... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 1999

    The sun finally shone on Glastonbury again, bringing a broad smile to the faces and performers alike. £150,000 was still spent on downpour... Read more

  • Glastonbury Festival 2000

    This year saw the return of the pyramid stage (the third pyramid stage) – 100 feet high and clad in dazzling silver. There was more camping... Read more