Curtains for long-running Adelaide festival as cars power on
While Adelaide’s Supercars event has been locked in until 2034, one the state’s long-running arts festivals has been canned and another will be ‘reimagined’.
Adelaide Festival Centre has quietly killed off Adelaide Guitar Festival after nearly two decades, with further changes flagged for OzAsia Festival as South Australia’s flagship performing arts venue unveils a “renewed” strategic plan.
Since it was founded in 2007 as the biennial Adelaide International Guitar Festival, the festival has hosted a swag of prominent local and international guitar-slingers including Tommy Emmanuel, Kaki King, Chris Thile’s Punch Brothers, and a tribute to the music of Spinal Tap starring bassist Derek Smalls (The Simpsons star Harry Shearer).
Running annually since 2021, it was one of several arts festivals founded under recently departed Festival Centre CEO Douglas Gautier AM, and has been led by artistic director and classical guitarist Slava Grigoryan since 2010.
This year’s program included performances from John Butler, Lior, Troy Cassar-Daley and Nancy Bates, a tribute to Led Zeppelin’s Physical Graffiti, and an orchestra of 50 guitarists aged 10 to 79. The festival’s regional touring program, ‘On the Road’, is slated to continue.
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The news was confirmed in a media release sent at 2pm on Friday afternoon, as the city prepared to host a weekend of guitar heroes with bp Adelaide Grand Final after-race headliners AC DC and Lenny Kravitz.
The announcement also promised the return of the popular Moon Lantern Festival and Lucky Dumpling Market in 2026, but the festival that hosts them – OzAsia Festival, another Gautier legacy first presented in 2007 – is now set to be ‘reimagined’. Festival Centre staples Adelaide Cabaret Festival, biennial children’s festival DreamBig, and First Nations program OUR MOB will also return.
It’s the first major change to the Festival Centre’s programming since the departure of Gautier, who announced his retirement from the role last October before a surprise move to Saudi Arabia to helm the 500,000 square metre Royal Arts Complex at King Salman Park in Riyadh.
Gautier’s successor Kate Gould, a former Adelaide Festival chief executive and Brisbane Powerhouse CEO, has also announced a new strategic direction for the centre that includes a year-round performing arts program dubbed ‘CentreStage’, and a contemporary arts program promising experimental work aimed at courting diverse and younger audiences.
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“By 2030, Adelaide Festival Centre’s venues will be destinations for arts, entertainment and culture, open to all, night and day, attracting both local patrons and new visitors through its programs and offerings,” Gould said in a statement. “We will extend Adelaide Festival Centre’s commitment to children and young people with an ambitious new goal: to deliver quality arts and cultural experiences to every South Australian school-aged child by 2035.”
The Festival Centre is currently closed to the public while Gould oversees a long-planned, $35 million refurbishment that includes new seating for the Festival Theatre, Dunstan Playhouse, and Space Theatre, along with foyer upgrades and a “new concept restaurant”.
The centre is slated to reopen in February 2026.
Slava Grigoryan could not be reached for comment, but a statement from Adelaide Festival Centre Trust Chair, The Hon. Karlene Maywald, paid tribute to Grigoryan, Gautier, and Guitar Festival executive producer Sarah Bleby.
“We thank Slava, Sarah and the hundreds of incredible artists and ensembles who have performed over the years, with too many performance highlights to name,” Maywald said.
This morning the state government also announced it had secured the annual supercars event until 2034, with the just-concluded bp Adelaide Grand Final drawing an estimated 285,700 attendees over the weekend.