Analysis of live TV coverage (Glastonbury 2011)

Glastonbury 2011 Analysis of the live coverage. The festival is where a majority of different bands and artists go to preform for a large audience the audience keeps growing over time because more and more people are getting into the different types of music that is played at Glastonbury for the analysis i will be looking at three bands that performed in the 2011 festival: Mumford and Sons, U2 and Elbow. U2 and Elbow preformed on the Primed stage which is the main stage at the festival and Mumford and Sons preformed on other stage which says the Glastonbury website. i will start by talking about the camerawork during Mumford and Sons. The camerawork for Mumford and Sons keeps cutting along to each member of the band, as the music tempo starts to speed up when the song reached the loudest part of the the song the camera cuts to swooping shots of the crowd then, when the tempo starts to go down the band are playing in the background with the crowd in the foreground. The next part i will talk about for Mumford and Sons is the editing used during the event because the coverage is all live they need over 1,000 different cameras to switch back and forth to give the viewing audience a better view of the festival with swooping shots for the crowd and the close ups for the band on stage. The next band i will be analysing is Elbow starting with the camerawork. The camerawork is more fixed to the stage getting close ups of the instruments and the band members throughout the performance there would always be a small cut to the audience which shows a larger crowd at the Primed stage than the other stage Mumford and Son's were preforming on. The last band i will be analysing is U2 i will be talking about the camerawork during the performance, the cameras are cutting between Bono and the crowd showing a far back swoop from back of the crowd moving into the stage when the camera cuts to the band playing the instruments then there is a cut to the back of the stage showing the band and the massive crowd in the background

The sound that you can hear during the concert is the muffled shouts of the crowd and the amplified sounds from the band's instruments and microphones. The amplified sound is used so that the people far back in the crowd can enjoy the bands performance. The Regulatory bodies involved in the festival are the BBC Editorial Guidelines copyright PRS.

The editing for the live festival is done by a single person who switches between cameras trying to make the audience at home gain a similar feeling to the people in the crowd who are watching the band perform live. There are over 1,000 cameras on each stage which switch between one another to get a different view from the crowd during the live show. The different shot types that are used in the live show vary from close-up,medium, long-range, wide and establishing shots.

The presenters at Glastonbury announced the bands that were performing on the stages, also when they were interviewing a band you could hear another band playing in the background with the crowd cheering. The section of the broadcast I watched showed the presenters interviewing U2 and in the background I could hear a different band playing while the crowd around the stage were cheering the noise was muffled so that it wouldn't interfere with the interview.

The sound from the amplifiers cancels out the sound of the crowds cheering and chanting. If the amplifiers weren't used then there would be no audio from the band because the crowd would drown out the sound with there cheering and chanting. The voice of the artist's need to be amplified for the audience in order to get the benefit of the performance, the instruments were plugged into amplifiers so that the music and the voice can be heard throughout the crowd and over the noise of the crowd.


The scenery behind the band indicates the genre of the group playing and is changed before and after a band comes on stage. The stage layout for Mumford and Son's is cleverly done by showing links to their album cover. The album cover shown is ' Love Your Grown' album and images of this cover are used as a background on the stage. With Elbow, the set is clear of everything but the newest album cover (Build a Rocket Boy's) is shown on the background so the crowd can hear what songs are on the album so they can choose whether to buy the album.

History of Glastonbury

1970 (19th September): The first Festival was held the day after Jimi Hendrix died, over a two day period and before long "word had got around". It was the Blues festival at the Bath & West Show-ground that had inspired Michael Eavis to begin a festival of his own although on a smaller scale. It had an attendance of 1,500 people and costed £1 for a ticket and free milk from the farm.

1971 (20th-24th June): The festival moved to the time of the summer solstice and was known as the "Glastonbury Fair". It had been planned by Andrew Kerr and Arabella Churchill who felt all other festivals at the same time were over commercialised. It was paid for by the few who supported the ideal so the entrance was free and took a medieval tradition of music, dance, poetry, theatre, lights and spontaneous entertainment. it was in this year that the first "pyramid" stage was constructed out of scaffolding and expanded metal covered with plastic sheeting, built on a site above the Glastonbury-Stonehenge lay line. The musicians who preformed recorded a now very rare album. The Festival is also captured "a la Woodstock" by a 1972 film crew that included Nick Roeg and David Puttnam. This film was called "Glastonbury-Fayer". the acts included Hawkwind, Traffic, Melanie, David Bowie, Joan Baez, Fairport Convention and Quintessence. the Attendance was estimated at 12,000 the tickets were free.

1981 (19th-21st June): The name was changed to Glastonbury Festival and Michael Eavis took the helm running the event again. This was the first "Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament" festival. Michael helped positively towards the peace movement by holding the festival. Michael helped positively towards the peace movement by holding the Festival at Worthy farm to benefit the Mid Somerset CND campaign. Michael had to convince National CND and said that with proper management the Festival could be turned into a profitable venture. Agreement was reached with national CND sending out information in the mailings, handing advanced ticket sales and allowing the use of the CND logo. It was up to michael to provide the money, arrange entertainment and organise the event, liaise with the authorities and organise market stalls ect. It was the year that it was decided to build a new pyramid stage however, this time it was a permanent structure, doubling as a cowshed and animal food store during the winter months. It took two months to build the permanent pyramid stage out of telegraph poles and ex-MOD metal sheeting. The CND logo was not present at these festival, as it was to heavy to lift into position at the apex. Michael Eavis eventually handed over approximately £20,000 to a very grateful CND. The acts that played were; New Order, Hawkwind, Taj Mahal, Aswad, Gordon Giltrap. The attendance was at 18,000 and the ticked costed £8.

1990 (22nd-24th June): The festival took the name of the Glastonbury Festival for Contemporary Performing Arts for the first time, to reflect the diversity of attractions within the Festival.  It was the twentieth anniversary of the first Festival but unfortunately ended with a confrontation between the security teams and travellers who were looting the emptying festival site.  This resulted in 235 arrests and £50,000 worth of damage to property and hired plant. Acts that preformed included The Cure, Happy Mondays, Sinead O’Connor and World Party, and the attendance was 70,000 while the Tickets costed £38 and the Programmes costed  £3.

1991 (25th-27th June): The sun finally shone on Glastonbury again, bringing a broad smile to the faces and performs alike. £150,000 was still spent on downpour precautions. The widest range of entertainment ever was on offer, with over 300 bands a kaleidoscope of theatre, comedy and cultural adventures, and more than 250 food stalls -  all published on a buzzing Glastro web site and broadcasted on BBC2. Greenpeace, Water Aid and Oxfam again Benefited. This year's event was sadly overshadowed by death of organiser Michael Eavis's wife Jean. A winged wicker sculpture was ceremony burned in her honour, whilst fireworks erupted into a moonlit sky. a few of the acts were; REM, Manic St Preachers, Fatboy Slim, Hole, Blondie, Al Green, Skunk Anansie, Lonnie Donegan, Marianne Faithful and Courtney Pine. The Attendance was 100,500 and the tickets costed £83 including a programme.

1994 (24th-26ht June): On 13 June 1994 the famous Pyramid stage burnt down in the early hours of the morning but luckily a replacement was provided by the local company who also provided stages for the NME and jazz stages. It was also the first appearance of the wind turbine beside the main stage providing 150 kw of power for the main stage area. Channel 4 televised the event live over the weekend an it increased the appeal of the festival to a wider audience. On the Saturday night there was a shooting incidence involving five people but no one was badly hurt. But there was the first death in the festivals history when a young man was found dead from a drug overdose. £150,000 was donated to Greenpeace, £50,000 to Oxfam and some £100,00 to local charities and good causes. The acts included; Bjork, Manic St Preachers, Orbital, Van Morrison, Lemonheads, Elvis Costello, Galliano and the Levellers. The attendance was 80,000 and the ticket price was £59 and £5 for the programme.