Penza, 13 April 2015. PenzaNews. A group of civil activists have announced a crowdfunding campaign for Jazz May festival. “After the bright story last year, we would like to hold a no less bright celebration again. However, the festival still has to struggle for survival. The times are tough, and ‘Penzaconcert’ dropped its participation in the festival budget to 55% compared to 70% last year,” wrote Darya Laiko, one of the Jazz May organizers, on her Facebook page on Monday, April 13.

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While earlier support from “Penzaconcert” and the Department of Culture and Archive covered the base expenses for performance schedule, soundware and advertising, “now even these vital festival expenses are only partially funded by them.”

“This has its positive side, since the festival becomes independent after showing that the city needs it, and the negative side, since our team now works in the dark,” Darya Laiko noted.

According to her, there is no money left for a green-grass celebration with nice food, children’s playground and entertainments.

“Too bad this has been set in stone only slightly more than a month before the festival. But the informal festival committee never stopped thinking about it, collecting ideas, forming the agenda, searching for money – and so the preparation is already on its final stage. This year, the festival will be held thanks to valuable support from the Russian Music Union, Alfa-Bank, Termodom and ‘Sputnik-city,’ Bank Kuznetskiy, Bit.Games and other companies whose titles will be announced in the upcoming days. Thank you!” added the Jazz May organization committee member.

Describing the current festival budget, she stressed it is currently in the negative, and thus asked all Penza citizens to help the event.

Any volunteer, she explained, can learn more about sponsorship packages by asking her or Oleg Rubtsov, one of the inspirers of the Penza jazz music event.

“If you want to donate to the festival personally, you can do it through our friends at the ‘Civil Union’ foundation. […] We will report on all expenses, and the foundation will not profit from it: it is involved only because a civil organization must act as an intermediary to make donations legitimate,” Darya Laiko explained.