Holger Jan Schmidt is a leading figure in the European festival sector, serving as General Secretary of YOUROPE, the European Festival Association.
With over 20 years of experience, he emphasizes sustainability and social responsibility in festivals, spearheading initiatives like the Take A Stand campaign. Holger has received prestigious awards, including the “Award for Excellence & Passion” at the European Festival Awards and the Arthur Award “The Unsung Hero” at the ILMC in 2023. He also co-authors guidelines for environmentally friendly events and participates in various European-funded projects.
Holger looks back at more than twenty years working at Germany’s biggest admission-free festival RhEINKULTUR in Bonn with a daily audience of 160.000, being in a leading position from 1998 until the festival’s last edition in 2011. Today Holger is a booker, consultant and part of the management teams of various festivals among those DAS FEST in Karlsruhe and SUPERBLOOM Festival in Munich.
In early 2023 Holger was awarded with the two most prestigious award he could imagine. Holger was honored with the “Award for Excellence & Passion” for his services to the European music festival sector at the European Festival Awards (EFA) during ESNS in Groningen. This was followed by the Arthur Award “The Unsung Hero” from the International Live Music Conference (ILMC) in London in the category “Industry Champion Award”. Both awards were voted for by a panels of international festival managers and music sector representatives.
Holger is contributing his expertise to various European funded projects such as “3F – Future-Fit Festivals” (Creative Europe), “FUSION – Festivals as social innovation incubators” (Erasmus+), “FUTURE FESTIVAL TOOLS – green competency for event professionals” (Erasmus+), “GEX – Green Europe Experience” (Creative Europe) and “EVERYWH2ERE” – bringing mobile hydrogen energy to festivals (HORIZON 2020). He is co-author of the book „stay SOUND & CHECK yourself“ dealing with stress and mental health in the live music, festival and event industry and co-wrote the „Sounds For Nature guidelines for environmentally friendly events“.
Holger holds a diploma in media economics from Rheinische Fachhochschule Cologne and was a lecturer for “Sustainable Festival- and Event Management” at Hochschule Fresenius (Fresenius University of Applied Sciences) in Cologne and Düsseldorf. Also he is an active musician himself.
www.yourope.org
www.take-a-stand.eu
www.go-group.org
www.dasfest.de
www.superbloom.de
www.bnpd.de
