‘We’re a new age travelling circus’: the duo who took Britney Spears to the Yorkshire seaside

When Peter Taylor found himself inside an LA office with 10 minutes to sell Scarborough Open Air theatre to Britney Spears’ agent, the words tripped off his tongue. “It’s like the Hollywood Bowl of Yorkshire,” the then new-to-the-game music promoter offered.

In that room, the best part of a decade ago, Taylor, one half of the gigs, festivals and theatre promoter duo Cuffe & Taylor â€" formed with best friend Daniel Cuffe in 2009 â€" laid the groundwork for Spears’ sold-out 2018 performance at the 8,000-capacity venue. The princess of pop joined a genre-spanning list of megastars from Kylie and Nile Rodgers to Diana Ross, the Beach Boys, Lionel Richie, Stereophonics and, this summer, Def Leppard and Mötley Crüe, to play the British seaside at the pair’s behest.

The hair metal outfits, and a returning Richie, are part of a five-day lineup for this summer’s Lytham festival, which also includes Sting, Blondie and Jamiroquai. The festival is held in the Lancashire seaside town of Lytham St Annes where Cuffe, 36, and Taylor, 42, grew up, met and still live.

Had a nice day … Stereophonics at Lytham festival, Lytham St Annes in 2019. Photograph: Lytham festival

Cuffe was studying sound engineering while Taylor was running a hotel on the promenade and dabbling in local theatre when, in 2008, they were separately roped in to help with a charity production of the musical Copacabana at Lytham’s Lowther Pavilion, to save the venue from demolition. “We ended up talking over the headsets and having an absolute ball,” says Cuffe of their first meeting. “There was a lot of slapstick, dry ice and pyrotechnics.”

Then, in 2010, the local council approached Taylor to evaluate tenders for a community event called the Lytham Proms. Priced out by large events firms, Cuffe and Taylor instead offered to take the project on in partnership with the council. They found an orchestra, and a phone number for soprano Lesley Garrett, and secured her as top billing for 4,000 people picnicking on the village green.

“It was a bit of fencing and a stage. We thought: ‘How hard can it be?’” says Taylor now.

“Famous last words,” adds Cuffe. “Turns out it’s ridiculously complicated.”

Taylor remembers: “We had no strategy and no money. We thought you just rang an act up and they’d come and do it. I did the VAT returns and designed posters in Photoshop. Dan drew a site plan and filled out spreadsheets. We built the fences ourselves.”

Their naivety paid off. “We made £10,000,” says Cuffe. “We met the next day and thought: ‘Let’s just do it 10 times again.’”

Taylor gave up the hotel and they signed up for a three-day proms event the following year. They took on staff and paid interns and ran a ticketing office from Cuffe’s mum’s dance and drama school. “Come 4pm there’d be tap dancing above us and singing lessons next door,” says Taylor. They continued hammering the phones for acts. “I think a lot of people just thought they’d better take us under their wing. It 100% could have gone the other way.”

Lionel Richie arrived by helicopter and couldn’t believe people were swimming in the North Sea

And they put all their money into it. Cuffe says: “That year was less financially successful but we’d stacked everything against the company: houses, relationships. I felt like a fraud, like promoters were a bigger thing than we were doing, but this job was outrageous. We’d do it at any cost.”

The pair booked Boyzone, Status Quo and Katherine Jenkins, and sold 10,000 tickets a night. “When we started advertising, people thought they were tribute acts,” Taylor remembers. “A couple of years later we booked Tom Jones. When we went to pay his deposit at the local bank, the cashier didn’t believe us.”

They may not yet have known the business, but they understood the power of live entertainment. “We knew what a good show was because we loved watching them,” says Taylor who, by then, had suspended his own showbiz ambitions having spent his school days moonlighting as H in a Steps tribute band. “There’s no school course on being a music promoter. People get into it through student unions but we didn’t go to university. My parents didn’t even have a car so we’d only see things at Blackpool Opera House. There was one trip to London, though, when I was 12, to see the musical Blood Brothers. We were in the worst seats, at the back, which was all we could afford. I couldn’t believe something on stage could make you feel that way.”

Cuffe’s first gig was Oasis at Cardiff International Arena, aged 11: “I was in awe. They were and still are absolute gods to me. But I was also fascinated by how all of that stuff got there then went to another city the next night â€" the telephone box and Rolls-Royce that were part of the set. I was amazed by the scale of it all.”

On a night like this … Kylie Minogue at Lytham festival in 2019. Photograph: Brad Hamer

By the mid 2010s they had partnered with more venues â€" Wigan’s Haigh Hall and Scarborough â€" but, in hindsight, were still operating on a wing and prayer. Taylor remembers: “Dan went to LA one year and rang around huge agencies saying he was in town. We didn’t have the money to be ‘in town’. He was just on holiday.”

Nonetheless, their experience and ambitions grew. When they were brought under the banner of Live Nation â€" the global gigs mega-outfit â€" in 2017, it opened more doors. They booked Lionel Richie for Scarborough in 2018. “He arrived by helicopter and couldn’t believe people were swimming in the North Sea,” says Taylor. Then Kylie, for Lytham and Scarborough, in 2019. “[In Scarborough] she performed The Locomotion on the seaside train that passes behind the stage.”

The headlines that disparaged northern seaside communities as unlikely stops for music’s big names only helped with marketing. “It was the end-of-the-pier analogy,” says Cuffe. “We had the last laugh. These venues were full and that’s hugely attractive to everybody in the business.”

They had hit on a formula: if you take acts to the provinces, where watching a gig in your back yard is cheaper than travelling to a major city, the buy-in is greater.

Taylor explains: “It became scientific in terms of who we placed where. Even for an enormous artist, dropping in on a provincial show can grow your audience. Two members of the household might see Def Leppard or Mötley Crüe in Manchester but, in Lytham, you take the kids. You get a new generation who might go again. I remember seeing an elderly woman having the time of her life watching Faithless perform here. She’d never in a million years have booked to see them at an arena.”

Lytham festival in 2018. Photograph: BH Photographic

They run events at six venues now â€" the Piece Hall in Halifax, Cardiff Castle, Chepstow Racecourse, Bedford Concerts, Scarborough and Lytham â€" but their reach extends to arena tours and theatre, nationwide. “We’re basically a new age travelling circus,” says Taylor.

They have endless stories of running through crowds with armfuls of toilet paper to restock loos, acts arriving late, or decorating Mariah Carey’s onstage Christmas tree for her arena tour when the set arrived with moments to spare from Paris â€" “I was literally sticking bows on giant presents so we didn’t have to cancel,” Taylor laughs.

The lows â€" “When it’s 4am, throwing it down, the tent’s leaking and you’re loading in a band in the middle of the night,” says Cuffe â€" are relished alongside the highs. “They say you shouldn’t promote your idol but Peter booked Noel Gallagher to play Lytham in 2016. That’s one half of Oasis playing our festival, in our home town. I’ve subsequently been able to talk to him but I couldn’t even hold a conversation that night.”

This summer, they have 64 outdoor shows and 1,000 nights of theatre. But there’s still a wishlist of acts that they’d love to get to the seaside. “I’m a kid of the 90s,” says Taylor, “I’ve tried to get Take That to our festival more times than I care to remember.”

And Cuffe? “The obvious. Oasis. I’d take them getting back together but it’d be the icing on top, and the cherry, if they played Lytham.”

Lytham festival takes place 28 June to 2 July. More info is available at lythamfestival.com and for info about all events go to cuffeandtaylor.com