By David Farrell
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Winnipeg Folk Festival
Following wildfires, air quality issues and flooding at festivals and venues over the summer, the Canadian Live Music Association has released a national climate risk study with tips on how the industry can take precautionary measures.
Canada’s live music industry is raising the alarm on climate change.
The Canadian Live Music Association (CLMA) has released a new national climate risk study, Sound Check: Climate Risk and Resilience in Canada's Live Music Sector, highlighting how the weather’s unpredictability is “now a structural issue” affecting the country’s live music sector.
Over 30 executives contributed to the survey’s advisory committee, including members of Live Nation, Evenko, Calgary Stampede, Winnipeg Folk Festival and Culture Montréal, among others
In the report, 83% of respondents say that climate change is affecting their events, with 87% expecting its impacts to increase over the next five years. The study uses “the CLMA's Climate Contingency survey, national disruption data and climate projections through the 2030s and 2050s.”
The study finds that weather-related disruptions, including wildfires, air quality issues and flooding, have sharply increased from an average of eight publicly reported events per year between 2010 and 2022, to more than 65 per year between 2023 and 2025.
Of the participants — many of whom run events spanning one to five event days annually — 78% reported at least one “moderate-impact” weather day, and 58% reported at least one “high-impact weather day,” with 70% revealing it has caused a partially or fully cancelled event.
Meanwhile, 35% reported “moderate [and] measurable financial losses” across their events and 14% cited “significant or severe impacts.” The CLMA found that only 15% of respondents had purchased “adverse weather insurance.”
If extreme weather disruptions continue between now and 2040, the CLMA report claims that “a central estimate of approximately $1.8 billion” attributed to the country’s live music event and festival economic value will be put at risk.
"This is an issue touching live music events in every corner of Canada—particularly but not exclusively outdoor ones,” says Maddy Oliver, CLMA’s interim executive director, who was appointed to the role after Erin Benjamin left the role earlier this year.
As climate change becomes a rampant issue across the country and beyond, weather-related issues deeply affect not only concertgoers — of whom there are over 20 million per year — but the entire music industry, which contributes $10.92 billion annually and provides over 101,000 jobs, per the CLMA's first-ever economic assessment in 2025.
In July, the four-day music festival Rock the Park in London, Ontario, ended early on its first night, citing hazardous air quality from wildfires across the province. The second night followed a similar trajectory, “after ongoing discussions with our artists, city officials, emergency services, and medical officials.”
Two other Ontario music festivals were affected by the wildfires: Burlington’s Music in the Garden, which postponed its one-day event, and Gravenhurst’s Tall Pines, which cancelled its second and final day of performances.
“Weather has always been part of producing outdoor events, but over the last few years, we've found ourselves planning for heat waves, flooding, wildfire smoke, tornadoes and other weather-related challenges in a way that simply wasn't part of our planning to the same extent before,” Tim Des Islets, the show producer of Music in the Garden, told Billboard Canada.
Two months later, a major hail and rain storm swept over the Greater Toronto Area, leaving Rogers Stadium, Toronto’s newest outdoor venue, with “significant damage,” including multiple rows of seats that collapsed and folded onto one another, only days before AC/DC was set to take the stage. While the city of Toronto ordered Live Nation to address the damage, the show was ultimately cancelled, putting an early end to the venue's 2026 concert season. Harry Styles and Slipknot have shows scheduled there in 2027.
With 82% of respondents considering climate risk when planning future events, the CLMA has also shared an accompanying toolkit with tips for weather-related disruptions. It includes suggestions for implementing plans to tackle disruptions, finding immediate solutions in a climate-related crisis and improving current strategies.
