Glastonbury Fest delivers record viewing figures for BBC

Stunning sets by Adele and Coldplay and a return to the spotlight by Jeff Lynne’s ELO at the UK’s Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm helped deliver record viewing figures for the BBC.

BBC TV and digital viewing figures reached a record high of 18.7 million over the weekend – up 3% from last year.

Adele’s Saturday night headlining set on the Pyramid stage drew the most attention, and not just because her dress took over 200 hours to make, with buttons and shells having to be hand embroidered on. The British singer drew a record 2 million and peak audience of 3.7 million, or a 23.7% share. Last year’s Saturday average was 655,000. 

Coldplay who closed the festival on Sunday nigh during heavy rain, also set a new record for Sunday night viewing – an average of 2 million with a peak of 3.4 million.

The band’s musically stunning sing-along set had a visual bonus that was entrancing, to say the least: 100,000 multi-coloured LED wristbands distributed throughout the crowd, pulsed in time to the music to provide something as neo-religious as it was carnival-like.

"This is our favourite place in the world!" Chris Martin yelled out during the opening chords to Yellow. Coldplay set a new record by becoming the only band to headline Glastonbury four times – in 2002, 2005, 2011 and 2016. Their 2011 set drew an average audience of 1 million.

Coldplay were joined onstage by Barry Gibb for two Bee Gees covers – To Love Somebody and Stayin’ Alive which Martin hailed as "the greatest song of all time." Gibb was originally to do the Legends slot but pulled out due to a family illness. When approached by Coldplay to join them, Gibb was a little anxious: he didn’t think the Glasto crowd would even remember those songs. The Bee Gees never played the festival.

Muse who headlined the opening night only drew 346,000 although the figure rose to 420,000 when it was replayed, and hit a peak of 796,000.

The highest viewing for a Glastonbury programme on the BBC was Jeff Lynne’s ELO whose set on the Legends slot had an average of 2.4 million. Last year’s Legends slot, with Lionel Richie, had an average audience of 1.71 million.

In all, the BBC broadcast more than 60 hours of Glastonbury 2016 content across its various stations, including Foals, New Order, PJ Harvey and Earth, Wind and Fire.