The final Easterfest was held in 2015 with the Christian music festival, which had become of Queensland’s largest ticketed drug and alcohol free events in the southern hemisphere, now the subject of a brand new four part podcast series to be released on Monday March 3. The Rise & Fall of Easterfest is written and hosted by 96five’s Justin Rouillon, who was a festival regular since 2000.
By the late 2000s Easterfest, previously the Australian Gospel Music Festival (AGMF), had grown to become the absolute highlight on the Australian Christian calendar. Tens of thousands of people – artists, crew and music fans would head to Toowoomba, toward the top of the Great Dividing Range, over the Easter weekend. From its beginnings in 1999, the AGMF saw the churches of Toowoomba join forces with the local chamber of commerce and Queensland Police to create a new tourism opportunity for the city.
Isaac Moody was in charge of the festival from 2000 until 2011, he told 96five’s Justin:
“The original committee had aspirations for thousands of people being there, but probably not a great sense of reality on how to make it happen. They just saw it as a tourism play like Tamworth (Tamworth Country Music Festival) and they didn’t have a
faith background, necessarily. And in fact, the people who were of faith would be in the minority of that initial board and working group.
This was people with no understanding of Christian music who wouldn’t have any idea that a band like Delirious existed or any of those sort of artists that were all well known in, I guess, more of a Christian community.”
In spite of that, the event would end up seeing attendances of around 40,000 people at its peak.
Justin said of the inspiration for the podcast:
“In the late 90’s I’d been very much into the local Brisbane band scenes, both in a mainstream and a Christian context. Brisbane had a booming music scene with events like Manifesto, Groundswell and the Australia Day Music Marathons, so when AGMF came along it just felt like an extension of what was already happening.
I loved the AGMF and Easterfest experience, and the opportunities it gave Australian artists to rub shoulders with some of the biggest acts in the world.”
The Rise & Fall of Easterfest is a four part series featuring those behind the scenes of the event including Isaac Moody, Dave Schenk and Linda Monteith, performers like Paul Colman and Phil Gaudion (Paul Colman Trio), Claire Hazzard, Joel Smallbone (For King + Country), Jeremy Fowler (New Empire), Matt Jacoby (Sons of Korah), Richard Thayil (The Empty Chair Project/Scat), Jeremy Bennett (Toupee Records/Battered Fish/Leo Nine), Naraah Seagrott (Alabaster Box) and more.
The Rise & Fall of Easterfest can be found available wherever you get your podcasts. It has been produced as part of Brisbane 96five’s 50th anniversary celebrations. Image is Newsboys‘ frontman Michael Tait entertaining at Easterfest in 2010 by Trent Rouillon.