On the end of Parachute Music Festival

On Wednesday last week, the CEO of Parachute Music announced that the festival would be no more. After making a “close to a quarter-million dollar loss” at the 24th Annual festival (held  in January this year), the board of trustees have decided that “it would be unwise to continue” with running the festival.

The news spread around Christian circles in New Zealand like wildfire, gathering mixed reactions – but on the most part, a sense of sadness was felt with many people sharing on Facebook their favourite memories, moments, bands, or experiences. I’m sure that Parachute Music festival also played a large role in creating many marriages!

Obviously for the studio, this is sad news. We have had a stall at Parachute every year that we have been in existence as 2ndcity Studios, and we were working strategically towards a large launch party for The Aetherlight in 2015. We have viewed Parachute Festival as a great place to engage with and interact with so many christian children, tweens, teens, and parents – all in the one place. It’s hard to find something else that gathers all these people into the same area, for such an extended but focussed time. We’ve had some great conversations, as well as securing some amazing leads and relationships through people visiting our stall. We’ve had some awesome interactions with children from our target age, and it has always been invaluable to us to listen to these children, and hear their worlds – what games they play, what movies they watch, what is capturing their imaginations at present. It’s also been incredibly insightful to talk to the parents of these children, and hear that they are excited about what we are building with The Aetherlight.

As I watched Mark de Jong’s video (embedded above), I reflected also on the current trends within “christian young people” and their engagement with media. I think that there is a time and a place for creating ‘christian media’, by christians, for christians. I think that this time is when the industry is new, or fresh, or young – much like gaming is today. Gaming, especially educational gaming, is just starting to emerge in New Zealand (and internationally) as a new phenomenon. At the moment, we feel very much like Mark and his team did 24 years ago when they created the first Festival for Christian Music. It was a new thing – festivals in NZ were few and far between, but they were a cultural phenomenon – and so Parachute Music Festival ‘exploded into the nation’s consciousness.’

We hope that The Aetherlight will do similarly.  We are here to ride that wave – for as long as it continues. I am sure that one day, the way we do this mission will need to also change. Perhaps young people wont be interested in a solely “christian” game. Perhaps they will. In any case, we are committed to doing the best we can, while we can, but at the same time staying attuned to what is happening around us – both in terms of God’s activity and also in the culture we swim in.

So, we are interested now in finding a replacement for Parachute Festival – is there something that already exists? A large scale, ecumenical gathering? Or will something new spring up in its place? If you know of something, let us know. We want to be where the children and the parents are.