Russian show business has suffered a heavy blow to the industry (VIDEO)

The poster for the Crocus City Hall concert hall was scheduled until March 2025. After the terrorist attack, the organizers canceled only part of the show, while the majority are urgently looking for suitable venues to reschedule the concerts. And there is an acute shortage of them: there are simply no halls with such capacity and engineering equipment suitable for musical performances in Russia, experts say

“The venue where every artist dreams of performing is equipped with the most advanced sound and lighting equipment, and the hall is lined with materials that improve acoustics,” this is how the advantages of the Crocus City Hall, which burned down on March 22, were described on the website that sold tickets to the concert hall. Statistics are also given here: since its opening in 2007, the complex has been visited by 4 million spectators, and every year more than 200 concerts and all kinds of shows have been held there.

The concert hall’s poster was scheduled until March 2025. This year, the Comedy Club show (March 28), the Avtoradio gala concert (April 26), a performance by musician Grigory Leps (July 15), a creative evening of musician Sergei Minaev (October 18), and a concert by the group “Disco Accident” were supposed to take place here. ” (The 20th of October).

On April 21, the annual Chart’s Dozen award ceremony with a concert, organized by Nashe Radio, was to take place at Crocus City Hall. “We made the difficult decision to cancel the show, although we really wanted to hold it,” Evgenia Kiseleva, general director of Multimedia Holding (which includes Nashe Radio), told Forbes. Now it is inappropriate to hold such events, the company believes. The Chart’s Dozen award has been presented several times at Crocus City Hall, and this is truly one of the best premium venues in Moscow, Kiseleva is convinced. This is the holding’s second cancellation of a major event in a year. “Our Radio was forced to cancel the rock festival “Invasion” in the summer of 2024 for reasons beyond the control of the organizers,” she clarified. “Providing the necessary level of safety for guests, artists and staff this year is an impossible task,” the official statement said.

The standard capacity of the Crocus City Hall is 6,200 people, the maximum is 9,500 if a dance floor is organized in the stalls, explained Tabriz Shahidi. In the case of the Picnic group, whose concert was to take place on March 22, the stalls were seated, that is, the capacity of the hall was 6,200 seats. All tickets were sold two days before the concert.

Halls of such capacity are in short supply, say producers and show business representatives interviewed by Forbes. “Crocus City Hall was a significant and iconic venue, primarily due to the combination of capacity, engineering solutions and transport accessibility – there are simply no such concert halls in Moscow, practically in Russia as well,” notes celebrity agent and producer Vadim Kormilitsyn. “And this is certainly a blow to the industry and concert locations.”

“Crocus was a home for many artists: good acoustics, great technical capabilities, spaciousness, comfort,” says Shahidi. The venue had status, it was considered prestigious to perform here: top artists, anniversary concerts, presentations, festivals and all kinds of award presentations – everyone wanted to get into Crocus,” explains Kormilitsyn. In the last year alone, large-scale anniversary concerts were organized here by singers Larisa Dolina, Lolita and Valeria. In April 2023, Avtoradio celebrated its 30th birthday at Crocus City Hall: the show was opened by singer Emin Agalarov, the son of Crocus Group owner Araz Agalarov. He sang his hit “I Live Better than Anyone.” Last December, the Vladimir Vysotsky “Own Track” award ceremony took place here.

About 50% of the commercial success of a show depends on the artist, the rest depends on the popularity of the site, experts say. Crocus City Hall had a 15-year reputation, fame and its own audience; some viewers specifically monitored events on the concert hall’s website and bought tickets there. And there were objective reasons that attracted spectators – a large parking lot, a convenient location of the complex on the Moscow Ring Road. In 2009, the Myakinino metro station opened nearby, the first in the Russian metro construction practice, built with the involvement of private capital – the Crocus Group company. The station building does not belong to the Moscow Metro; it is operated by the Crocus Group, Vedomosti wrote.

However, there is still somewhere to move large concerts, experts are convinced. Musical shows are also held at the VTB Arena and Megasport sports complexes, and at the Small Luzhniki Arena. In 2019, the Palace of gymnast Irina Viner-Usmanova opened in Luzhniki. “We now have well-developed sports arenas, which are in one way or another adapted or can be adapted as a concert venue, they have technologies for quickly installing sound and light, for example, the CSKA Arena, and the events planned at Crocus City Hall will flow there,” – says Kormilitsyn.