What happened at Krumlin Festival: The music festival that brought Elton John to Calderdale but ended in disaster
It was supposed bring some of the biggest names in music of the day to Calderdale – but Krumlin Festival ended in disaster with the police and even the army called in.
Elton John, Manfred Mann, Fairport Convention and Pink Floyd were all on the bill for the three-day event in the village near Barkisland in August 1970.
The festival was the idea of Derek McEwen and Brian Highley, both then in their 20s.
Brian was the landlord of The Anchor pub in Millbank, and his friend, Derek, managed folk groups.
They started selling tickets at just three shillings to help pay for some publicity.
“We quickly put them up to 30 shillings and as soon as we started booking major bands it was 50 shillings,” said Brian.
By the time the festival started on the Friday, they had assembled an impressive line-up that included Elton John, Pink Floyd, Ralph McTell, Pentangle, The Pretty Things, Fairport Convention and Sandy Denny.
But alarm bells were starting to ring. They had reportedly sold 16,000 tickets – but this wasn’t reflected in the money coming in – and they had banked on selling more tickets to break even.
“On the Friday, we only took £4,000 at the gate and at that point it became clear there were forgeries,” said Brian.
He had to contact Pink Floyd and tell them not to travel to Yorkshire because he knew they could not afford to pay them.
And then, to make matters worse, the weather turned and a storm hit the site on the Saturday evening.
As many people were sleeping in thin plastic bags which offered little protection from the wind and rain, the organisers were forced to pull the plug at around midnight.
“The temperature dropped to just above freezing and there were thousands of cases of exposure so we just had to stop everything,” said Brian.
“On Sunday they were warning people on the radio not to travel because it was a disaster area and they needed the roads to get ambulances in and out.”
The police and even the army were called in to search the site to make sure everyone had survived the storm.
The festival cost in the region of £60,000 to put on, and the organisers were left owing £30,000.
Brian went on to write questions for Trivial Pursuit and also written a foreword to Ben Graham’s book - Pink Floyd Are Fogbound In Paris: The Story of the 1970 Krumlin Pop Festival.