Festival goers at Ontario’s Hillside Festival 2024.Supplied
On July 17 to 19, the annual Hillside Festival happens again on Guelph Lake Island in Guelph, Ont., an hour’s drive west from Toronto. It is a mid-size indie music event with a big reputation for cutting-edge programming and a hippie-folk heart.
Hillside began in 1984, but its tastemaker cred wasn’t completely established until a then-unknown Arcade Fire played the festival in July, 2004. Two months later, the Montreal indie rockers blew up after releasing their heroic debut album, Funeral. Though the price to book the band had jumped considerably, the not-for-profit Hillside was able to hire them at a discount rate for its 2005 edition.
“They were ridiculously nice to us,” said the festival’s long-time artistic director Samir Baijal. “It was Arcade Fire’s way of thanking us for taking a chance on them the year before.”
On the strength of Arcade Fire’s appearance (along with fellow headliners Broken Social Scene, Sam Roberts and Sarah Slean), Hillside sold all its 15,000 tickets for the three-day event in 2005, for the first time in its history. The attendees who caught Arcade Fire’s legendary performance − the band marched through the campground after their set − got their money’s worth.
“It was an epic set and an iconic moment for us,” recalled Baijal, who spoke to The Globe and Mail on a video call. “A whole ton of people came to Hillside because of Arcade Fire, and the U.S. press took notice.”
Over its history, Hillside has developed a reputation for eclectic music curation and its idyllic island setting in a university town.Supplied
In 2006, the festival sold out its weekend passes on the first day of sales and ran out of day passes soon after. The hot streak continued through 2012, which was the last time Hillside was at full capacity for its three days.
This summer, Baijal hopes another rock band from Quebec leads to the same kind of popularity spike instigated by Arcade Fire more than 20 years ago. The hyped artist is Angine de Poitrine, an avant-garde Saguenay duo with polka-dot outfits, masked anonymity and new ideas on microtonal music.
Baijal booked Angine de Poitrine in February, around the same time a video of the duo went viral. When a booking agent sent an e-mail about the band to Baijal and a few other festival programmers around the country, he bit:
“I thought, ‘this is really interesting stuff, even if they don’t blow up.’”
They blew up. On June 27, Angine de Poitrine drew more than 70,000 people, according to estimates, to a free outdoor concert presented by the Montreal International Jazz Festival. Both Hillside and Ottawa Bluesfest have promoted them to bigger stages. In Toronto, the masked math-rock duo have sold out the 600-capacity Mod Club for three nights (July 14, 15 and 18), and they’ll open for Jack White at RBC Amphitheatre (on July 14, right before the first Mod Club show).
Canadian experimental rock band Angine de Poitrine performs during a concert part of the Nuits Botanique music festival in Brussels on May 28.JOHN THYS/AFP/Getty Images
Baijal says Hillside has sold an unusually high number of weekend passes, meaning fans aren’t just coming for the strange band that broke the internet. And that’s the idea: Come for Angine de Poitrine and stick around to discover artists such as Welsh finger-picking guitarist and astrophysicist Gwenifer Raymond or French-Canadian and Abénaki singer-songwriter Mimi O’Bonsawin, a member of Odanak First Nation.
Over its history, Hillside has developed a reputation for eclectic music curation and its idyllic island setting in a university town. It has its feet in both the folk-festival world and the indie-rock scene, with special attention given to diversity in the artists it presents. A team of more than 1,000 volunteers are on hand. And in a city represented in the Ontario Legislature by Green Party provincial leader Mike Schreiner, Hillside is a pioneer in event sustainability.
“Hillside is a convergence of good ideas,” said Derek Andrews, who was a long-time music programmer at Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre and is now performing arts manager at the Aurora Cultural Centre. “They’ve hit the mark in so many categories that it’s a must-attend decision.”
Arcade Fire perform at the Juno Awards in Toronto in March, 2022. On the strength of Arcade Fire’s appearance at Hillside in 2005, the festival sold all its 15,000 tickets for the three-day event for the first time in its history.Nathan Denette/CP
Among Hillside’s initiatives is its Girls & Guitars Songwriting Course, which helps women build confidence, develop their songwriting skills and share their stories on stage through mentorship and creative collaboration. The program celebrates its 10th anniversary this year.
“It’s a good fit for Hillside,” said the course’s founder, Doris Folkens. “They want engagement, accessibility and community building.”
Hillside is also a must-gig for artists. Gord Downie played at the festival twice with his solo bands. The Tragically Hip was too big for the festival in 2006, but gave a concert on the Hillside site on a non-festival night.
“Gord loved being here. He said onstage the first time that he had always wanted to play Hillside,” Baijal said. “We had a few lovely chats in the backstage trailer. He truly appreciated what we did and the fact that so many up-and-coming Canadian artists would grace our stages.”
Not only has Guelph native Miranda Mulholland performed at Hillside on three occasions, but she founded her own event, the Muskoka Music Festival, on what she saw there: “I used Hillside as a model, not just for the audience experience, but the artist experience. Hillside is like a summer camp for musicians.”
This year’s edition of the Muskoka Music Festival (Aug. 22, at the Gravenhurst Opera House) will be its 10th − and last. Like Hillside, Mulholland’s not-for-profit festival has been a platform for diverse artists at various stages of their careers. She booked Indigenous wunderkind Jeremy Dutcher not only before his two Polaris Music Prize wins, but prior to him even releasing an album.
“One of the things small festivals do really well is the discovery of artists,” Mulholland said.
Doing the grunt work can make it tough for not-for-profit festivals to survive. Last fall, organizers of Ontario’s Riverfest Elora pulled the plug on the event after 15 years because of financial shortfalls. Mulholland decided to end her festival because of competition from the nearby for-profit Tall Pines Music Festival, which this summer is headlined by Odds, the Tea Party, Hawksley Workman and the Tragically Hip’s Paul Langlois.
“It’s driven by nineties bands, mostly all men, usually white,” Mulholland said.
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Hillside has faced the same challenges. The Southern Ontario market is oversaturated with festivals and concerts. The WayHome Music & Arts Festival, for example, was a major three-day camping event held at the Burl’s Creek Event Grounds in Oro-Medonte, Ont. From 2015 to 2017, the three-day camping event, backed by deep-pocketed promoters Republic Live, brought in the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Frank Ocean, Neil Young and Arcade Fire.
WayHome, like other events such as Field Trip, the Toronto Urban Roots Festival, Virgin Festival and Toronto Bluesfest, failed to take root. The fees for A-list headliners were just too high to sustain.
The smaller Hillside has become a de facto Toronto event − a quarter of its attendees come from the city − that survives thanks to the dedication of volunteers, tight budgets, generational fandom and an audience willing to be challenged by artists who are new and unfamiliar to them.
“Our audiences check their tastes at the gate,” Baijal said. “There is no secret formula except that there is something truly unique, authentic and welcoming that takes place on that island for three days in July.”
Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story included an incorrect quotation of Miranda Mulholland.