Be Free (festival)


Be Free ) was a Belarusian rock festival that took place in Ukraine since 2007. Bands from Poland, Ukraine, and France participated in the festival too.

Be Free 2007

Date – September 22, 2007.
Location – Lutsk.
Compère – Vitaĺ Malinoŭski.

Bands

Dates – August 9-10, 2008.
Location – Lviv.

Bands

August 9

The beginning of the program was the performances of 3 young bands, the winners of the European Radio for Belarus contest.
Dates – August 22-23, 2009.
Location – Chernihiv.
Compère – Aliaksandr Pamidoraŭ.

Bands

August 22

The planned festival was canceled by the authorities of Chernihiv.

Criticism

In 2008 Rock-Princess Kasia Kamockaja as a columnist over at naviny.by made such a takeaway on the festival, “An established group of fans, an established group of musicians come there. For the Ukrainian public, this is not interesting.”
At a press conference on the eve of Be Free 2009 in Minsk, Lyapis Trubetskoy’s producer Yevgeny Kolmykov suggested that holding such a festival is not possible in Belarus, as “the atmosphere of the music festival involves relaxation, and there would be a huge amount of police, and this police creates a background that does not contribute to relaxation at all.”

Bans

The departure of the participants at the first festival in September 2007 was accompanied by their preventive detentions on the Belarusian side.
The last festival in 2010 was thwarted by the Chernihiv authorities, which, according to the comments by Vitaĺ Supranovič, co-organizer of the event, to Nasha Niva, were “in contact with the official Belarusian side,” which strongly advised “to not to allow the festival.” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported on the political shade of the bans too. In his column over at naviny.by, Neuro Dubel’s frontman Alexander Kullinkovich linked the cancellation of the festival with the approaching 2010 presidential election..

Appraisal

The concept of the festival was positively appraised by Siarhei Mikhalok, Oleh Skrypka, and other musicians.