BA (Hons) Live Event and Festival Management

The BA (Hons) Live Event and Festival Management degree is a groundbreaking programme with the ever-changing live music ecosystem at its heart. Developed in consultation with key bodies of the live events industry, this highly practical contemporary course will connect you to the cutting edge of the fast-moving and constantly evolving live events sector. You’ll be encouraged to look to the future to see what’s possible, as you collaborate on real-world projects and build impressive creative, business, management and innovation skills.

• Designed for the next generation of entrepreneurs and professionals in the multi-billion-pound UK live events industry, you’ll develop a host of practical, theoretical and creative skills in live production, event management and arts curation. Immersing you at the heart of the industry, you’ll gain the knowledge and abilities you need to run creative live music events across your professional career. 
• From the outset, you’ll become fluent in the language of the live events sector, learning a range of hands-on business, marketing and project management skills. With autonomy across all three years to focus on your areas of interest, you could potentially be running your own live events from your first year onwards.  
• You’ll explore the extensive logistics involved in running live events and festivals, as you learn many practical industry tips such as how to run a soundcheck, how to set up a basic lighting rig, how to host a ‘zero carbon’ and ‘leave no trace’ event, and even what to do if your festival site is rained upon.
• You’ll gain a comprehensive understanding of the strategic demands of planning and managing a festival. Deep diving into site management, covering everything from planning, safety, licensing, vendor relations, through to crowd control. With festival goers becoming increasingly conscious of the environmental footprints of large gatherings, you’ll consider sustainability in detail and be challenged to envision even more sustainable features and solutions. 
• You’ll also take inspiration from non-Western event and touring approaches, while you study more recent forms of immersive multimedia activities, such as live streaming, virtual reality opportunities and holographic performances. You’ll also gain knowledge of the financial and economic side of live event and festival management as you apply to funding bodies like national arts councils to help you bring your creative ideas to fruition.  
• Your three years of course modules will take you on a highly curated journey. As well as covering the fundamentals of live event management, the specialisation of this programme will enable you to demystify the live music, festival and events sector, encouraging both your creativity and entrepreneurial spirit.  
• By exploring the live events scene in its entirety, you’ll experience the full breadth of industry models and approaches – from being part of a collaborative network at the grassroots level, to discovering the realities of the field’s larger commercial sector. While these industry areas operate in fundamentally different ways, the foundational knowledge you’ll gain during ICMP’s BA (Hons) Live Event and Festival Management degree will see you transition smoothly from non-for-profit to commercial projects – using suitable skills at an appropriate time in the right setting – if that’s where your career takes you.
• You’ll study in small, personalised learning groups with guidance from established live event sector tutors whose aim is to help you maximise your confidence to shape the future of this exciting and dynamic creative industry.
• Diversity, inclusivity, accessibility, representation and the environment are central to the course, as you develop concepts that ensure everyone who wants to can experience and easily access events.
• The inspiring Live Project module in your final year is your chance to showcase your talents to an exceptional level, collaborating with your peers to bring an ambitious creative project to life. Alongside this, you have the option to complete your final year with an industry experience module, allowing you to work in an industry organisation while gaining academic credits. This may be at a venue, events management company, booking agency or onsite at festivals throughout the country. 
• Whether your plan is to be an industry professional in venue management or events marketing, or establish a career as an agent, promoter, event producer, fundraiser or something else entirely, this degree will raise your expectations of what’s creatively possible, while teaching you the core practical skills to turn your elaborate plans into reality.

Year 1 (level 4)

In year one, you’ll cover the fundamentals of live event management. The scope of work is wide and varied, and you’ll uncover answers to questions including: What is the industry? What is the live music ecosystem? And how do the two interconnect? By the end of your first year of learning, you’ll know how to run a venue safely, the different roles involved in the industry, the key principles of marketing and entrepreneurship, and how to create content that gets noticed.

• The Music Business
• Principles Of Entrepreneurship & Marketing
• Fundamentals Of Live Production
• The Live Music Ecosystem
• Venues And Hospitality
• Content Creation And Online Presence

Year 2 (level 5)

Creativity meets real-world experience in Year 2, as you take your entrepreneurship skills to the next level. Put your theory into practice as you curate creative concepts, submit funding applications and plan the finance and logistics of events, tours and festivals. Exploring innovative new mediums, you’ll be encouraged to brainstorm truly original immersive events of the future that will leave audiences enthralled. You’ll love every minute of this hugely exciting year, packed with specialist live event management modules that cleverly entwine and interconnect.

• Touring, Festivals and LogisticsEvent Concept And Curation
• Live Streaming And Entertainment Technologies
• Financial Planning And Fundraising In The Live Industry
• Event Production And Management
• Marketing For Events And Festivals

Year 3 (level 6)

Your final year will see you exceling as a live event management professional, focusing on those areas of the industry you find particularly interesting. By now you know how the industry works, you have skills in logistics, arts curation and economics, and you can successfully run your own event. You’ll have one final chance to put your ideas into practice with the ambitious collaborative Live Project double module. An amazing opportunity to showcase your future career, you’ll graduate ready to thrive in whichever area of the live event industry you choose.

• Live Entrepreneurship
• Live Project
• Music And Entertainment Law
• Strategic Festival Management
• Talent Management Strategies (optional)
• Industry Experience (optional)

Teaching, learning and assessment

• You’ll be taught at our campus in Kilburn, using classrooms, lecture rooms, tech suites and in-house music venue. While you're a student at ICMP, you'll have access to these facilities outside of class time to study and, if you're also a musician, you're welcome to rehearse and record your music here, too.
• You’ll have access to the Student Services Department for support and advice concerning welfare, finance, personal development, safeguarding and more. You’ll also have access to our Professional Development team, ‘The Hub’, who provide you with bespoke music industry careers advice and access to unique industry opportunities. 

Teaching and learning

• On the BA (Hons) Live Event Management programme, you’ll be taught through a variety of teaching and learning methods including lectures, small tutorial groups, workshops, hands-on technology laboratory tutorials, group work and student-led classes/presentations.
• When not attending lectures, seminars or other timetabled sessions, you'll be expected to continue learning independently through self-study. Typically, this will involve reading articles and books, working on individual and group projects, undertaking research in the library, and preparing coursework assignments. Your independent learning is supported by a range of excellent facilities, including our Learning Resource Centre, many performance and practice rooms, and well-equipped tech suites.
• In your first year, you'll be in timetabled teaching activities such as lectures, seminars, and workshops for typically 9-10 hours a week, you’ll also have personalised one-to-one tutorials scheduled throughout the year.
• You'll undertake more independent study and have less scheduled teaching in years 2 and 3, but can typically expect 9-10 hours of timetabled classes per week in your second year and 6-8 hours of timetabled classes per week in your third year.

Assessment

• Assessment activities will include, but are not be limited to, student presentations, portfolios, individual and group projects, case studies, written examination papers, aural examinations, coursework, group problem solving, reflective journals, self and peer assessments.