Lack of funding closes Norway's biggest street parade

  • Published
    Mon, Feb 14, 2005, 09:00
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  • Norway’s biggest street parade is no more.
  • Lack of funding closes Norway's biggest street parade image
  • Summer ParadeNorway’s biggest street parade is no more. "Sommerparaden" (Summer parade) was started in 1996 to show people the electronic music-scene of Norway. Based on an idea by Dr. Motte, the founder of Love Parade in Germany, the team behind the parade with Thomas Olsson (Prof. Scuba) in the lead, tried to make the scene also grow in Norway. The popularity was never as big as in 2003, where over 40.000 attended the parade. Little would Trond Tune know, when announcing "This will be Norway’s biggest parade ever!" in his opening speech, that it would mean that it was the last. As early as in January 2004, it was rumored that there would be no 2004 parade due to lack of funding, it was later confirmed in May. And this year it looks to have headed the same way for the fiscal reasons. Media spokesperson for the event Lennart Jonsson has confirmed the bad news:
    It's with great sorrow we see that we have to shut down the Summer parade. It have given us unbelievable joys over the years it has existed. It will really be missed. The reality is that currently there are no possibility to finance the Summer Parade with the limited amount of funding that we have available”
    A meeting at the end of January this year realised that without the annual cultural economic support, they had co choice. The Arts Council of Norway and the local government (Oslo Kommune) both turned down every single application for public economic support and made in impossible to gather the necessary amount needed to run such an event. More info on the parade is at the site, which unfortunately won’t be updated with exciting 2005 Parade announcements.
RA