Kanye West's planned concert in St Petersburg will not go ahead at Gazprom Arena, the stadium's administration announced on Monday evening, August 24. The venue's press service said it had no agreements of any kind with the organizers of the American rapper's show, which had been scheduled for October 10 and 11.
The arena said it was not and never had been the organizer of the event, and that no contract for renting the stadium had been signed. Because no such agreement exists, the venue said, the concert cannot take place there. The stadium added that the rapper's visit to Russia was being arranged by the agency Say Agency, not by the arena itself.
Gazprom Arena is a football stadium in St Petersburg, best known as the home ground of FC Zenit St Petersburg. Kanye West, who also performs under the name Ye, is a Grammy-winning American rapper and producer.
Organizer says rental agreement exists
Anna Subcheva, director of Say Agency, told the news outlet Lenta.ru that her company did have a rental agreement for the venue. She said the specification for the event had been fully agreed with the stadium, and that the arena's own Telegram post came as a surprise to the organizers.
Subcheva said the specification had been agreed with the venue and that the company had everything it needed, noting that the arena itself had previously promoted the concerts and even given away tickets to them on its own social media accounts.
According to Subcheva, the agency does not want to move the concert to another venue. She said Say Agency wanted to hold the show at Gazprom Arena specifically and saw no obstacles to doing so. She added that the company had a rental contract in hand, though it had not yet been signed. Say Agency would continue negotiating with Gazprom Arena over the performance, she said.
Say Agency addresses fans
Say Agency also issued a statement to ticket holders. The company said it had announced the YE concerts in St Petersburg on the basis of an official letter that the venue had approved, and that the arena had in turn provided a specification, with a rental agreement sent afterward.
The agency said the concert had not been cancelled and that it was trying to reach the venue to find out why the post had appeared and to resolve the matter, promising to keep fans updated. Say Agency said the posts on the arena's own channels had not been coordinated with the company, and that the stadium had not notified the agency of its statements in advance.
Luzhniki offers to host the show
Pavel Poselenov, general director of Moscow's Luzhniki Stadium, told the outlet Mash that his venue was ready to host Kanye West instead of Gazprom Arena if the organizer approached it. There has been no official confirmation of this from Luzhniki's own channels or from Poselenov directly.
Reactions to the cancellation
Vitaly Borodin, head of the Federal Project for Security and Anti-Corruption, urged people to celebrate the disruption of Kanye West's concert, calling it a victory for civil society. He said he wanted to give people good news, that the American rapper had been cancelled in Russia, and called it a victory. Borodin suggested the show would not simply be moved to another venue but would not take place at all.
Lawyer Sergei Zhorin said that if the concert were cancelled or postponed, ticket buyers would be entitled to demand a full refund of the ticket price.
