Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival – April 19-21, 2024

History of Coachella Valley Music & Arts Festival

We can trace back the origin of the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival to a 1993 concert. Pearl Jam had a dispute with Ticketmaster about the service charges paid on each ticket. As a result, they shifted the concert to the Empire Polo Club. The festival proved the site’s viability for hosting large events, and it was chosen for the first Coachella Festival held in October 1999. It was a two-day event. No event was held in 2000. But, Coachella returned as an annual single-day event in April 2001. In 2002, it again went back to the two-day format. Due to demand, Coachella was extended to have a third day in 2007 and eventually a second weekend in 2012. Now it is held on consecutive three-day weekends in April, with the same lineup each weekend.

Coachella is one of the world’s illustrious and most profitable music festivals. In 2017, around 250,000 people attended the festival and organizers made approximately $114.6 million. Apart from music, they also created art installations and sculptures.

Around 1997, Goldenvoice was struggling to book concerts against larger companies, and they were unable to offer guarantees as high as their competitors. They brainstormed their options; the result was the idea of a music festival. They also thought of the idea for the one with multiple venues and multiple performances. Performers were trendy artists who were not that much a chart success. They foresaw a market they could capture, and the rest is history.