With Cuffe & Taylor expanding its portfolio of events for 2025, the promoter’s co-founder Peter Taylor has given IQ the lowdown on bringing superstar acts to UK regional markets.

The Live Nation-backed company is debuting new concert series Blackweir Live (27 June-9 July) in Cardiff, Wales, this summer, in addition to launching the 30,000-cap Chelmsford City Live (4-6 July) in Essex.

The latter will be headlined by Justin Timberlake, Duran Duran and Olly Murs at Chelmsford City Racecourse, while Blackweir, which is being staged in partnership with Depot Live, will star Noah Kahan, Alanis Morissette, Slayer and Stevie Wonder.

“We’ve had good success with our Cardiff Castle shows and we went to Chepstow Racecourse for a couple of years, but we definitely needed a greenfield site in Cardiff,” says Taylor. “I think the audience is more confident of going into Cardiff city centre than to try and navigate their way to Chepstow, so we started talking to the council 18 months ago about the site and that’s how Blackweir was born.

“We’ve got the ability to do up to six shows. The cap is 35,000, but we can configure it from around 20,000 upwards, depending on the setup. Hopefully, it will become a staple in the greenfield calendar for acts that perhaps, traditionally would play one of the parks in London. And when the stadium isn’t available in Cardiff, we’ve got another option now.”

Announced in mid-March, Wonder is also one of the headliners of Cuffe & Taylor’s flagship Lytham Festival. Working with the music icon represents something of a bucket list moment for the promoter.

“We’ve created nearly half a million tickets out of nothing in the north of England”

“I’ve tried to book him since I started Lytham Festival,” says Taylor. “He was always on my wish list, but he comes to the UK very infrequently. We usually wouldn’t announce something as late as we did. It was a bit of a risk waiting because there was no guarantee it would happen. Fortunately, it all came together and it will be really special. He’s a legendary artist and for a lot of people it will be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see him.”

Lytham, which runs from 3-6 July, will also be topped by Morissette, Timberlake and Simple Minds. Its scheduled opening day was cancelled entirely following the withdrawal through injury of headliners Kings of Leon, whose 29 June Blackweir Live gig was also pulled.

“This will be a sellout year [for Lytham] and next year is the 15th edition, so the expectations are bigger than ever,” says Taylor.

Alongside Lancashire’s Lytham Festival, the company also programmes the 5,500-cap The Piece Hall and 8,000-cap Scarborough Open Air Theatre in Yorkshire. Taylor is proud of how the previously unfashionable towns have become established tour stops on the UK circuit.

“I call it my northern belt: Lytham, Halifax, Scarborough,” he says. “Fifteen years ago, those markets didn’t exist. We’ve created nearly half a million tickets out of nothing in the north of England. Halifax is heading for a record year again, with 36 shows all doing extremely well and 85% of our audience coming from within 10 miles of the venue, which is just incredible. It’s the biggest attended concert series now in England, and Scarborough also continues to deliver for us.

“We didn’t come along and buy a festival, or take audience off another festival, we created an audience, and it just goes to show that it’s hyperlocal now. In Halifax, the average person is coming to four shows and when we had Boygenius a couple of years ago, something like 70% of the audience were going to a show for the first time.”

“I’ve always been known to throw a wild card in and, gosh, I couldn’t have bought the publicity that we got off the back of Will Smith”

Halifax’s 2025 schedule includes the likes of Pendulum, James, The Corrs, Gary Barlow, Deftones, Olly Murs, The Script and Weezer, with Scarborough set to welcome Basement Jaxx, Shed Seven, Snow Patrol, Blossoms, Rag’n’Bone Man, Judas Priest and the Smashing Pumpkins, among others.

Continuing a tradition that has attracted US stars including Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and The Hollywood Vampires to the Yorkshire Coast, Scarborough will also host a gig by actor Will Smith on 24 August. Taylor says the booking, which also includes a Cardiff Castle show the following night, came from a conversation with Smith’s booking agent, WME’s David Levy.

“I was very brave,” says Taylor. “We offered two quite large outdoor shows: Cardiff Castle and Scarborough Open Air Theatre, 9,000 and 8,000 caps respectively, put people love nostalgia. I’ve never tried to find the next star. I’ve got lots of great colleagues at Live Nation that do that very well, but my business model has always been to take established or nostalgic acts, or acts that want that extra tour after their album. I’ve always been known to throw a wild card in and, gosh, I couldn’t have bought the publicity that we got off the back of Will Smith.

“We got Britney because I, tongue in cheek, called Scarborough ‘the Hollywood Bowl of Yorkshire,’ and the rest is history. There were people at the beginning that thought Scarborough wasn’t a credible venue, but the acts we’ve had in there now speak for themselves.”

This year also marks the continuation of Cuffe & Taylor’s arrangement to present Forestry England’s outdoor live music series, Forest Live, after agreeing a seven-year contract in 2023.

“Last year was us getting to know each other really.” says Taylor. “We’ve consolidated from six forests to basically the four larger venues, just to make the economies of scale work a bit better.”

“Audiences want a premium offering and we want to deliver a great experience”

The 2025 lineup includes artists like Paul Heaton & Rianne Downey, Nile Rodgers & Chic, McFly, Sting and Gary Barlow.

“It’s the first time Westonbirt Arboretum has had six shows, and every single one of them will sell out, so that’s a huge result for us,” he adds. “In Cannock and Thetford, again, all four shows are set to sell out, and we’ve got five shows in Delamere, which is going to be a sell out season for the first time.”

Ticket pricing is at the forefront of Taylor’s mind.

“I’ve always worked hard to attractively price the tickets in the first place,” he says. “Some shows are more attractively priced than others. Paul Heaton’s a great example, all of his tickets are £39.50 and they all sell out, without exception, so it’s something I’ve been very mindful of. But don’t get me wrong, when you’re looking at the likes of Stevie Wonder in a smaller venue like Lytham – we’re a third of the size of Hyde Park – I have to charge a premium. But it’s a once in a lifetime artist, and people are happy to pay that premium where it’s appropriate.”

Other Cuffe & Taylor events include Summer Sessions in Derby, Bedford, Plymouth and Southampton, plus live music series at Lincoln Castle, Powderham Castle and Llangollen Pavilion.

“We’ve invested a lot in customer service over the last 18 months, trying to improve the quality of what we do,” concludes Taylor. “Audiences want a premium offering and we want to deliver a great experience.”

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Promoters Cuffe and Taylor and Depot Live are partnering to launch a new 35,000-cap concert series in Cardiff, Wales.

Blackweir Live, which will take place at Blackweir Fields alongside the River Taff, promises to bring major international touring artists to the city and will debut with four headline shows next summer, with dates and ticket details to be announced soon.

The site will be the city’s largest greenfield venue, and the launch further solidifies the relationship between Cuffe and Taylor and Depot Live – the live arm of Cardiff events space The Depot – have a pre-existing relationship, working together to promote TK Maxx presents Cardiff Castle.

“Blackweir Live presents a very exciting opportunity to bring huge international artists to Cardiff,” says Cuffe and Taylor co-founder Peter Taylor. “We have a great relationship with Depot Live and the people of Cardiff and we look forward to enhancing that further in the years to come as we look to bring the very best in the world of music to perform in this beautiful city.

“The city has a rich musical heritage, and we are committed to contributing to that legacy by bringing world-class live music experiences right to the heart of it”

“At Cuffe and Taylor we pride ourselves on creating some of the best live music opportunities on greenfield sites across the UK and to add Blackweir Live to that roster is something we are very excited about.”

Over the past two years, Cuffe and Taylor and Depot have presented almost 30 headline shows at Cardiff Castle, welcoming 170,000 people this year alone for concerts by the likes of Manic Street Preachers, Catfish and the Bottlemen, Avril Lavigne, Smashing Pumpkins, Idles and Tom Grennan.

“We’re incredibly excited to launch this new outdoor venue in Cardiff,” adds Nick Saunders, founder of Depot Live. “The city has a rich musical heritage, and we are committed to contributing to that legacy by bringing world-class live music experiences right to the heart of it. Complementing our plans for more incredible acts at Cardiff Castle next year, the addition of our Blackweir Live events promises for a truly memorable summer of music in 2025.”

Live Nation’s Cuffe and Taylor programmes all live music events at the 5,500-cap The Piece Hall and 8,000-cap Scarborough Open Air Theatre, both in Yorkshire, UK. It also promotes Lytham Festival, Forest Live and Bedford Park Concerts, in addition to events at Cardiff Castle and Chepstow Racecourse, and linked with Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod last year.

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