It has been announced today (October 17th) that Truck Festival is amongst the organisations that will receive financial aid in part of the Cultural Recovery Fund. The newest instalment from the Cultural Recovery Fund will see a £76 million grant being distributed to over 558 venues.
Night and Day, Manchester’s iconic music venue, has also been selected to receive help from the vital fund. This news follows the Cultural Recovery Fund awarding financial support to over 1000 organisations earlier this week, with an agenda geared towards the preservation of Britain’s beloved music venues and spaces.
The Cultural Recovery Fund ensures that selected festivals, live music venues and arts spaces will be kept safe from the looming threats of coronavirus related closures until April 2021. Back in October, influential venues such as Liverpool’s Cavern Club and The Brudenell in Leeds received chunks from the £257 million coronavirus fund. Now, the next recipients of the government’s £1.57 billion bailout fund have been unveiled.
Night and Cafe, the famous Mancunian music venue, will get a £64,745 grant. The essential grant will enable Night and Cafe to host socially distanced shows from December, and full capacity shows from 2021. This is not the first closure threat directed at Night and Cafe, who faced and then fought against closure threats back in 2014.
Jennifer Smithson, director of Night and Cafe, expressed her utmost gratitude for the grant. Smithson relayed that “We’re delighted to have received support from the Cultural Recovery Fund. The grant enables us to plan for the future when we look forward to having live music back at the venue once again.” Other paramount organisations set to receive grants are London’s Fighting Cocks Bar & Venue, Nottingham’s Hockley Hustle, Coventry’s Kasbah and of course, Oxfordshires Truck Festival. Fighting Cocks will receive £163,732, Hockley Hustle £98,800, Kasbah £180,838, whilst Truck Festival will receive £219,232.
Additionally, Sheffield’s Yellow Arch Studios, the hallowed halls in which Pulp and Arctic Monkeys recorded music, will receive £161,053. The Music Venue Trust, the organisation behind the massively successful #SaveOurVenues campaign who have been fighting to save Grassroots music venues since March, has welcomed the government grants with open arms.
In an official statement, Mark Davyd, CEO of the Music Venue Trust, stated that “The Culture Recovery Fund released by Arts Council England on behalf of the Department for Digital Culture, Media and Sport is an essential injection of support.”
Davyd continued, explaining that the Cultural Recovery Fund “does not just protect cherished and much loved cultural infrastructure, it also enables these venues to stage a gradual, planned and safe return to work for staff, artists and crew and that will support the whole grassroots sector as we seek to Revive Live.”
The Cultural Secretary Oliver Dowden acknowledged the importance of the Cultural Recovery Fund, saying that “This is more vital funding to protect cultural gems across the country, save jobs and prepare the arts to bounce back. Through Arts Council England we are delivering the biggest ever investment in the arts in record time. Hundreds of millions of pounds are already making their way to thousands of organisations.”
Further details of the Cultural Recovery Fund grants and its recipients will be revealed this week.
