The Aireys Inlet Open Mic Festival is now in its 16th year. The festival runs the weekend after the March long weekend and has been historically considered an off-season weekend for the town until the Music Festival was created.  The weekend has now become our biggest weekend outside of the January peak tourist period.

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We are extremely proud of our community festival.  Each year the festival presents over 140 performances covering many genres of music and types of acts.  From full rock bands to solo acoustic acts on 9 stages with annual attendance at over 5000 over the 3 days.  This provides a fantastic opportunity for up-and-coming musicians as well as established acts to perform to large crowds with professional sound equipment and stage crew.  Since the festival was created it has inspired the formation of over 40 local bands.

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Each year we have a Special Mystery Guest to close the festival. Colin Hay, Dan Sultan, Tim Rogers, Mark Seymour, The Hoodoo Gurus, Rockwiz Orkestra with Ella Hooper and Vika and Linda Bull, and Tash Sultana have all been past SMG's.

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Adalita was our SMG for the 2018 festival, she put on a great gig, ending with all the locals kids joining her on stage. 

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Our festival is unique in many respects, in particular entry to the festival is free.  We provide donation buckets and people happily pay what they think it is worth.