Boston Calling Music Festival Taking 2026 Off, Will Return in 2027

BOSTON (WBSM) — Boston Calling, the musical festival that takes over the Harvard University athletic complex each Memorial Day weekend, is taking a year off.

The festival posted to its social media accounts Friday that it is taking a “gap year,” and when it returns, it will be on a different weekend.

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Why Is Boston Calling Taking a “Gap Year?”

We’ve reached out to the promoters of the festival to find out specifics, and will update this story if they get back to us with any specifics, but some issues in recent years may have played a part in the decision to skip a year.

In 2024, overcrowding had led to some safety concerns when large crowds gathered for Chappell Roan’s performance and the back-and-forth performances at the relatively close Red and Green stages with Megan Thee Stallion, Hozier and The Killers only caused the crowd to swell more.

That led to the decision for 2025 to eliminate the Red stage and open up that entire section of the grounds to the Green stage.

This year’s festival also suffered from rainy and overcast weather throughout the weekend.

Boston Calling Has Been a Spring Staple Since 2013

The first Boston Calling was held in May 2013 and for the first three years of the festival, there were two editions: one in May, and one in September, and they took place at City Hall Plaza in downtown Boston. In 2016, it switched to just once a year and moved to Harvard.

Outside of a two-year break in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the annual festival has remained at Harvard.

Why Is It Called Boston Calling?

Co-founders Brian Appel and Mike Snow came up with the idea for a Boston music festival when they were working for the Boston Phoenix and its alternative rock radio station WFNX. When those two outlets went under, the duo decided to go forward with the event on their own.

They named the festival Boston Calling after The Clash’s seminal 1979 album London Calling.