Where there is a small Tomorrowland in Luxembourg

Pulsating beats and booming bass in front of an urban backdrop: For six years, the Loa Festival has been the meeting point for fans of electronic music from the Grand Duchy and the Grand Region. The festival can even be referred to as Luxembourg’s Tomorrowland, because it is strongly reminiscent of the world -famous mega event.

Unusual outfits and hairstyles, lots of glitter and confetti, light, laser and fire shows, elaborately designed stages as well as a merging, dancing visitor mass distinguish the experience at a purely electronic festival. Something that was not knew in Luxembourg until the first edition of the Luxembourg Open Airs (Loa) in 2019.

« At that time we simply wanted to bring a new musical experience to Luxembourg: a festival where only electronic music is played, with a lot of decoration and animation. Just as you knew it from abroad, » explains Sebastian Jacqué, one of the four Loa founders.

The Loa Festival remains in the south of the country in 2025

When we meet the young man on the Place de l’académie in Esch/Belval, the first spring beams can be seen. The concrete site between the sublime blast furnaces – historical traces of Luxembourg’s steel industry – and modern high -rise buildings are gradually warming up. The area looks quite large – and accordingly offers enough space for several stages and stands.

In exactly one month, the Place de l’Académie is transformed into the scene for the upcoming Loa edition, the first for this year. The festival has been taking place twice a year since 2022: the Loa Season Opening in May and the Loa Season Closing in September. While the opening is now in Esch/Belval for the fourth time, the closing is not organized as usual at the Place de l’eur Europe at the Philharmonie.

The reason: the renovation work in the Philharmonie. « That’s how times are changing – so you have to adapt, » says Sebastian Jacqué. And as the Loa organizers announced about three weeks ago, the festival found a new home for its September edition: the Metz melt in Esch/Alzette.

« The Metz melting is an iconic area and offers an extraordinary framework. We already know this industrial atmosphere from our site in Esch/Belval, but that is even greater. The soul of the Loa festival now consists of the various stages-and of course we can build it up on the site between Esch and Schifflingen. »

Around 30,000 festival goers a year

However, the Loa Festival cannot take place forever on the Metz melting site. After all, a new district is to be built there, which offers living space for around 10,000 people. « We are extremely grateful that we can organize this year’s September edition there – with the perspective of being able to take the festival there next year. But we see what is in two or three years. »

So Sebastian Jacqué seems to tackle the whole thing rather calmly – or at least he doesn’t put pressure on himself. The focus is now on to bring two good festivals to the stage this year. But how do you actually manage such big events? After all, the LOA with its two editions receives around 30,000 people a year.

« It is mainly teamwork. At the first edition in 2019, of course, a lot was very new for us. But you learn to organize yourself over time. But there is an enormous team behind it. We are only a small team all year round, but it is expanded for every event, » emphasizes Sebastian Jacqué, who now works full -time for the LoA.

In the meantime, the LOA has three full -time employees and one person who works all year round as a freelance (freelancer) for the festival. Around 400 volunteers, as well as the staff of the technology teams and security, are then added per festival pad.

« We have to grow healthy »

In any case, the festival has developed enormously in recent years: every year, the organizers await visitors with a new surprise. The 2020 edition had to take place as a livestream due to the pandemic, but a festival could be organized in a smaller frame in 2021.

« In 2021 we turned the LoA a Covid check event and were able to receive up to 2,000 visitors. » Since it was generally rather quiet in the event industry, this brought the Loa particularly much visibility both nationally and internationally. Today, 40 percent of visitors from abroad travel to the Luxembourg Electrofestival. « This number has more than doubled in the past two years, » said Jacqué. The average age of the visitors, however, is 28 years.

Nevertheless, the Loa co-founder notices: « We have to grow healthy. » It is important to develop further, become bigger and known, but everything to the right extent. The first edition in 2019 was still available free of charge. 5,000 people were present at the very first Loa Festival in Kirchberg.

« We quickly noticed that we still have to demand admission to carry the expenditure. The costs for logistics, for example, also increase with the claim. » In the meantime, world -famous DJs like John Newman are on the stage of the Loa. But the music is not the only thing that distinguishes the festival.

« It is important to us that the Loa takes place in a cool, urban framework. The goal is to have the music merging with the extraordinary venues and to bring the whole range that electronic music has to offer. A day on the LoA should become a unique experience for everyone. The DJs are only part of it. »