Welcome to Hard Talk on the BBC World Service with me, Stephen Sacker.

My guest today has been in the music business for more than 50 years.

Harvey Goldsmith's unique talent involves neither voice nor instrument.

His skill is staging events.

He is the arch promoter, responsible for massive stadium concerts, supergroup tours,

and extraordinary one-off extravaganzas which have captivated the world. Perhaps his most famous

gig was the live aid concert to raise aid money for the Ethiopian famine in 1985. He has worked with the biggest musical stars

from the Rolling Stones and Freddie Mercury to Luciano Pavarotti. And he's still at it. At least he would

be if it weren't for the COVID pandemic, which has snuffed out live culture and entertainment across much of the world.

Even now, with vaccines offering real hope of an end to the pandemic, it's not clear how and when

the live arts scene will get back on its feet. The multi-billion dollar creative industries

are facing an existential crisis.

And nowhere more so than in the UK where Brexit has brought with it new costs and complications.

So how resilient will our cultural fabric prove to be?

Well, Harvey Goldsmith joins me now.

Welcome to Hard Talk. Back in November, you said this.

You said almost 50% of events agencies, such as your owner guess, do not expect to survive

beyond the end of this year. And if it goes to February and beyond, that is where we are now,

75% won't survive if events have not resumed by then.

So here we are at that doomsday month you were talking about. I mean, you're still around.

You're still trying to keep your business afloat. Do you think you were exaggerating a tiny little bit?

Not really, not at the time. and I'm not exaggerating now.

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