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GLASTONBURY FOUNDER FEARS FOR FUTURE OF THE FESTIVAL

The festival currently doesn’t have a home in 2019...

Glastonbury revealed that they plan to host an event away from its current Worthy Farm site in either 2018 or 2019 in May, with founder Michael Eavis later revealing plans to take the event to Wiltshire’s Longleat estate in 2019.

Now fears over the future of Glastonbury have been raised, as Ceawlin Thynn, Viscount Weymouth, vetoed discussions to take the festival to his 10,000-acre estate.

“'I fear for Glastonbury festival,” Eavis told The Telegraph after the Longleat snub. The plans to move away from Worthy Farm are said to follow land ownership issues and safety concerns around a gas pipe there.

Eavis is reported to have had detailed discussions with Lord Bath, Viscount Weymouth’s 84-year-old father, who held the reins of the estate until his son took over in 2010.

“Longleat probably won’t happen anymore,” Eavis said. “Lord Bath is really keen. I went to him because I knew him when he was a boy. But he and his son aren’t agreeing, and they don't speak very much, so it’s hard to make decisions. I haven’t been able to sit down with all of them at the same time.

“Ceawlin and [his wife] Emma don’t like the mud. They saw the mud at its worst. They were supposed to come and see it all cleaned up on September 1, but they didn’t turn up.

“They said to clean up all that mud, they’d have to restrict the whole of the operations at Longleat for about three months and it’s too expensive.”

If Glastonbury Festival has failed in their bid to move to Longleat, they have less than three years to find a home for the 2019 event.

In July, DJ Mag revealed that Block9, Glastonbury’s mecca for underground house and techno, have plans to open an art installation meets music venue in London in 2018, before going on to tour it around Europe.

Rob McCallum is DJ Mag’s deputy digital editor. Follow him on Twitter here.