European Festival Awards Lifetime Achievement Award to be presented to Jean-Louis Brossard and Béatrice Macé from Les Trans Musicales (France)

Honour will be presented amongst a host of awards from Best Major Festival to Headline Performance Of The Year and many more in Groningen, The Netherlands

On Wednesday 13th January 2016 the annual European Festival Awards will see one of France’s most distinguished event organising duos receive the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award’, presented by Yourope.

Jean-Louis Brossard and Béatrice Macé have been the driving forces behind Les Rencontres Trans Musicales throughout its rich 36 year history – a festival that set out to support local performing artists in its hometown of Rennes in France and ended up enriching the musical landscape of the entire country, attracting such artists as Lenny Kravitz, Ben Harper, Björk, Daft Punk, Too Many DJ’s, Stromae, Jungle, Kate Tempest to make their first appearances in France.

Today Les Trans shines as one of Europe’s most important and vibrant international showcase festivals. The dust is still settling on this year’s epic edition which took place across 5 days from 2nd to 6th December with over 55,000 people watching over 130 performances by artists from more than 20 countries.

As well as running the annual festival, the Association Trans Musicales, led by Jean-Louis and Béatrice, also manages the Ubu venue, a leading proponent in Rennes’ music scene which helps to develop original new talent and celebrates cultural diversity.

Steve Jenner, Festival Awards Director and Co-Founder comments: “New talent is the lifeblood of the live music industry. Through Les Trans Musicales, Jean-Louis and Béatrice have 37 years of their lives promoting it and Europe’s musical landscape is all the richer as a result. We are extremely proud to put a spotlight of recognition on this pair of heroes to the live music industry. This award is overdue.

Jean-Louis Brossard says: “When Les Trans were born in 1979, we couldn’t imagine dedicating our entire lives and careers to the festival. 37 years later, that’s what we actually did. We would like to thank the jury for this remarkable recognition. It is an honor to us as well as les Trans and we will share this fruitful pleasure of a well-achieved job with the whole team.”

Béatrice Macé adds: “When we got the email announcing that we would receive the Yourope Lifetime Achievement Award, we were really surprised and it left us speechless for a while. We didn’t ask for it. This is why it has a special value and it means a lot to us!”

The EUROPEAN FESTIVAL AWARDS, presented in association with YOUROPE and Eurosonic Noorderslag, will return in the New Year to celebrate the successes of Europe’s music festival industry. The gala award show will open Eurosonic Noorderslag in style on Wednesday 13th January 2015 at De Oosterpoort in Groningen, The Netherlands.

Throughout the evening titles spanning from ‘Best Major Festival’, ‘Artists’ Favourite Festival’, ‘Promoter Of The Year’ to ‘Anthem Of The Summer’ will be handed out to the great and good of the festival world.

Decided by a combination of public vote and industry juries, the European Festival Awards are the only pan-European body solely dedicated to recognising the contributions and achievements of the event organisers and performing artists that generate billions of Euros for local economies and brighten up the summer for tens of millions of festival-goers each year.

This year’s European Festival Awards featured over 350 festivals from 50 different European countries, with over 800,000 votes cast.

Tickets to the event are on-sale now at eu.festivalawards.com/buy-tickets

About the European Festival Awards
The European Festival Awards is the only event solely dedicated to recognising the achievements of the event organisers and performing artists that generate billions of euros for local economies and brighten up the summer for tens of millions of festival- goers each year. Decided by a combination of public vote and industry juries, the awards are presented at a sold-out ceremony that takes place on the opening night of Eurosonic Noorderslag. This year saw a record breaking edition with over 1.2 million votes, and more than 350 festivals taking part from 50 different European countries.

The European Festival Awards were established in 2009 in co-operation with Festival Awards Ltd, Yourope (the European Festival Association) and Eurosonic Noorderslag. The European Festival Awards show takes place in De Oosterpoort in Groningen, NL.

eu.festivalawards.com