Music | 11 September 2011

Pinkpop Festival, or Pinkpop for short, is a festival held at Landgraaf, Netherlands. It is held annually on the Pentecost weekend (Pinksteren in Dutch, hence the name). In 1970, the first festival took place in Geleen, now part of municipality Sittard-Geleen and was held on the Monday following that weekend. Today, Pinkpop is a 3 day festival, from Saturday to Monday, and visited by approximately 60,000 people a day with performances on 3 separate stages. In 35 years, 1.5 million people have attended Pinkpop. More than 500 musical acts have played at the festival. In 1994 (the 25th edition), it was decided to sell only 60,000 tickets, to prevent overcrowding due to the popularity of the festival. In 1995, it was made into a 2-day festival. Two years later, in 1997, this was further expanded to three days.