Esoteric Music Festival Cancelled Days After Receiving Council Permit
"To say we are disappointed is an understatement – we are gutted," said festival Managing Director Sam Goldsmith.
Esoteric Music Festival (Credit: Wink Photography)
Days after the Buloke Shire Council voted to approve a one-year planning permit for this year’s Esoteric Music Festival to go ahead, the event has been cancelled.
The development comes after significant stress for the festival. Last month, The Music reported that the Victorian “psychedelic music, arts and lifestyle gathering” event was in danger of being cancelled after the local council recommended refusing its planning permit, which was approved on Monday (3 March).
However, festival organisers cancelled the event after the Council's Municipal Building Surveyor denied their application for a Place of Public Entertainment (POPE-OP) permit on Tuesday (4 March).
It’s standard practice for that permit to be approved in the hours before the event due to tight timelines to ensure the correct infrastructure is in place. The Building Surveyor denied the permit, citing 33 grounds of refusal. When the planning permit was approved on Monday, it was subject to 47 conditions.
The POPE-OP permit is a requirement under the Building Act 1993 and cannot be overturned by Councillors. Event organisers appealed to Victoria’s state Building Surveyor, Steven Baxas, to intervene. Unfortunately for the festival, Baxas supported the decision to deny issuing the POPE-OP permit.
Festival organisers also met with the Premier of Victoria, Jacinta Allan, and the Minister for Housing, Harriet Shing, to get the event over the line.
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The 2025 Esoteric Music Festival was scheduled to begin yesterday (6 March) and conclude on Tuesday, 11 March. It was to be held in the Victorian town of Donald.
“We are extremely sad to announce that Donald’s Esoteric Music Festival will not be going ahead this weekend,” Esoteric Music Festival Managing Director Sam Goldsmith said.
Goldsmith added, “To say we are disappointed is an understatement – we are gutted. This is a devastating blow for all involved – from our patrons to the local businesses that have been planning for this all year.”
Describing the decision to deny the POPE-OP permit as “bureaucracy and politics gone mad,” Goldsmith continued, “Despite overwhelming evidence that the Esoteric Music Festival is safe and compliant to run, we have been left stunned by the decision of the Municipal Building Surveyor not to grant a permit and will now have to postpone the festival until 2026.
“Since 2017 this event has been a lifeline for Victoria’s regional tourism and live music scene, injecting more than $15 million into the local economy and supporting thousands of jobs in the Wimmera Mallee region.
“We implore all of our patrons, please hold onto your ticket for next year so that we can continue running this event and supporting Victoria’s north-west region as we have for the past eight years and will come back even stronger in 2026.”
Goldsmith ended the statement by assuring ticketholders that they’ll be communicated directly about this year’s event no longer going ahead and offered a full refund if they can’t attend next year’s event.
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