Concerts | Tavastia had an embarrassing double whammy: the gig was canceled with hours’ notice

Helsinki Tavastia, one of the most prominent concert venues, was supposed to have two shows on Wednesday, but one of them was canceled at the last minute for an embarrassing reason.

On Wednesday, September 18, Tavastia was organized Pedro Hietanen (1949–2023) memorial concert. On the same evening, the Semifinal club, located downstairs in Tavastia, was supposed to have a concert by two indie bands.

However, the joint concert of the bands Fan Theories and Pop Therapy was canceled only four hours before the start of the concert, as the Semifinal space was also booked as a back room for the performers of Hietanen’s memorial concert.

The bands announced the matter on their Instagram accounts, among other things.

“This just in: our gig tonight has been cancelled, the venue is double booked because of Pedro Hietanen’s memorial concert. (This band hobby is also Satan’s workplace sometimes)”, Fan Theories wrote in his publication.

There were more than 20 performers at Hietanen’s memorial concert, among others M.A. Numminen, Pirkka-Pekka Petelius, Ismo Alanko and Pepe Willberg.

Things to do and Semifinal work in close cooperation, but regarding Wednesday’s gigs, there was a data breach between the parties, says Tavastia’s CEO Mari Hatakka for HS.

“This was a really miserable thing, this has probably never happened before,” he laments.

“The premises of the semi-final are often used as a back room for bigger gigs, but in this case the information did not pass. We are still investigating the chain of events, at which point the outage occurred.”

According to Hataka, there were so many performers at Hietanen’s memorial concert that Tavastia’s other back room facilities would not have been enough for them.

According to Hataka, they are trying to arrange a new time for the joint concert of the Fan Theories and Pop Therapy bands as soon as possible for the Semifinal club.