Many music venues around the country are hanging on by a thread due to the Pandemic

Monday, 1 February 2021 13:13

That's according to Ray Blackwell from DeBarra's in Clonakilty who was speaking following the release of a new report by Live Venue Collective.

The collective is made up of 28 small and medium venues in Cork and across the country who staged 405 live shows during lockdown after receiving funding from the Department of Tourism, Culture and the Arts.

The shows involved over 2,100 employees, 655 artists and attracted over 416,000 virtual audience members.

Speaking to RedFM News, Ray Blackwell says today's report shows how successful the initiative was and says further steps need to be taken to protect jobs in the industry:

"We feel it [the report] speaks for itself in how beneficial it was. We're still only barely hanging on as music venues. DeBarra's is my home business- my family business- and we've been closed since March and it's an integral part of our community. And the same for many of the venues in the collective, they all service their own communities and their own musical ecosystems. We hope that the proof of the report will warrant further support for this initiative."