Just two days before the event was to go ahead, Mudgee's Sunset Sounds music festival was cancelled by organisers, leaving a bitter taste in the mouths of music fans.
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Friday's wet weather was to blame, the soggy ground making it impossible to safely erect the stage at the Craigmoor Wines site.
Mudgee' cancellation comes following several announcements that other Sunset Sounds events would not be going ahead either. Concerts at Gosford and the Yarra Valley were also cancelled in recent weeks.
Marc Christowski from Empire Touring, the company behind Sunset Sounds and Wildflower Festival which is coming to Mudgee in October, said the most recent cancellation was a bitter blow.
"It's two years work down the drain," he said. "We... first started planning that show literally two years ago.
"The last thing I was expecting to hear yesterday morning was that the ground was too wet. I mean, we got a phone call from the guy... at the company that's doing the staging, and he said 'Look, I've got some bad news here. Our semi trailer just got stuck in the mud and it's going to be unsafe to put up a scaffolding stage.'"
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Claudine Stephens is one of many people who travelled to Mudgee, planning to attend the concert that now have to make alternate plans. Claudine travelled from Sydney in a convoy or caravans with a dozen other friends.
"We were all pumped... We actually put in annual leave so that we could get up here early and make a long weekend of it," she said.
"We all left quite early from Sydney. And pretty much rolled into Mudgee, and not sooner had we literally pulled into near where the show ground was. We've got an email... to say that it had been canceled.
"Whilst they've got to look after the safety of the bands and things like that. Every local that I've spoken to is just gobsmacked that it was cancelled."
Marc said he understands the disappointment from ticket holders and the hundreds of staff involved in organising the event.
"We've lost so much money. I mean... insurance doesn't cover everything. Insurance doesn't cover COVID cancellations. And, you know, it's just a really very hard game to be in at the moment," he said.
"The other issue is that there's so many people have left our industry because of all these challenges. And the cost of putting this sort of event on makes it really hard to break even, and then you have something like this happen.
"It's just, it's just a bitter blow. I don't know what else I could say about it."
On Friday 4 March it was announced via social media that the Sunset Sounds at Rochford Wines in the Yarra Valley set for Saturday 9 April had been cancelled 'due to unforeseen circumstances after COVID postponements'.
Similarly, on Wednesday 16 March it was also announced via social media that the Sunset Sounds at The Entertainment Grounds Gosford set for Saturday 9 April had also been cancelled 'due to unforeseen circumstances after COVID postponements'.
Marc assured fans that Sunset Sounds will return to Mudgee.
"We'll be back with Sunset Sounds, I just thought I'd get it together to say - when I found out yesterday that it was canceled. I mean, what ideally I would have said was, 'You know what, we'll postpone it and the new date will be this date and blah, blah, blah," he said.
"...we've got to coordinate many things, you know, the artists, the promotion, the venue, the production staff on the day. It's all got to line up..."
Organisers said tickets would be automatically refunded and that current ticket holders would be eligible for early pre-sale 'when the next show is announced.' While the cancellation notice was made on March 16, as of Friday 25 March tickets for the Gosford event were still available for purchase on the Ticketek website.
Marc urged music fans to support the upcoming female-led Wildflower festival set to kick off in Mudgee at the end October. The lineup features; Missy Higgins, Kasey Chambers, Kate Miller-Heidke, Sarah Blasko, Deborah Conway, Alice Skye and Georgia June.
"I beg people to buy tickets to Wildflower. And just keep supporting live music... there's nothing like it."
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