Sofar Sounds

Sofar Sounds (or Songs from a Room) is a global community where music lovers and artists come together to experience music in an intimate setting at a secret concert. The events started in London in March 2009 by Rafe Offer, Rocky Start and Dave Alexander. The lineup for the concert is not disclosed until each event starts, while the location is announced only the day before. The ethos behind this is that highlighting headlining acts encourages people to turn up late and not respect the other performers. All genres are welcome to apply to perform. Local city leaders and their review teams curate the evenings.

There are now more than 400 Sofar Sounds gigs each month, many of which are hosted in members’ living rooms. Sofar has communities in more than 300 cities worldwide.

Musicians, bands and artists can sign up to play at events, choosing to be paid from voluntary attendee contributions via a hat being passed around the audience (or in some cities, digital donations), or having their gig filmed, edited into a video and uploaded to the Sofar Sounds YouTube channel which is also shared on the website. Some gigs are live-streamed. Typically, three artists perform at each gig. Emphasis is placed on the crowd being respectful – switching off their phones and listening. Many cities have wait lists for attendance. There are around 2,000 requests for each London gig, but invitations to the purposely-small gig are extended to only 50-60 of those applicants. In June 2015 Sofar Sounds teamed up with Uber to host a series of secret gigs.

UK acts who have participated include James Bay, Wolf Alice and Bastille, who raised money for charity War Child. Will Young was a surprise guest and there has been an appearance from Robert Pattinson and Yeah Yeah Yeahs front woman Karen O. Some US acts include X Ambassadors, Leon Bridges and Fantastic Negrito, while acts such as Núria Graham and Ali Somay have played Sofar Barcelona and Sofar Istanbul respectively.