Royal Jaarbeurs honours Lowlands origin with music festival The Flight Revisited

Utrecht, 25 June 2025 - On Saturday 30 August 2025, the very first 'The Flight To Lowlands Paradise' festival will return to its birthplace: Royal Jaarbeurs. With the festival The Flight Revisited, Jaarbeurs will relive the legendary 1967 edition, when the very first The Flight to Lowlands Paradise took place here. With performances by, among others, The Hague-based psychedelic rock band Supersister, who attended the second edition in 1968, the festival will revive the free spirit of the time. The occasion is the book launch of From Flight to Lowlands by author Patrick Bakkenes. Around the festival, there will be an exhibition in TivoliVredenburg and a book launch at the Kargadoor on this particular origin of Dutch festival culture.

The Flight Revisited: an ode to the past and the future of 'The Flight To Lowlands Paradise'
The festival The Flight Revisited offers a varied programme of music, poetry, art and performance including performances by Supersister, Doctor Velvet and The Caverns. As with the original 1967 edition, it is not just about music, but also about the overall experience. Visitors can count on vintage footage and an atmosphere that refers to the 60s, in a contemporary form. Jeroen van Hooff, CEO Royal Jaarbeurs: "For us,The Flight Revisited is more than a festival. It is a tribute to the ideals of creativity, freedom and cultural innovation that are still in our DNA. That 'The Flight To Lowlands Paradise' started here in 1967 is something to be proud of. With this event, we are bringing that history back to the spot where it once began."

Book launch on first 'The Flight To Lowlands Paradise' at Jaarbeurs
The reason for the festival The Flight Revisited and the exhibition is author Patrick Bakkenes' book From Flight to Lowlands, which will be published on 15 August 2025. In this book, Bakkenes delves into the story of the two very first Flight to Lowlands Paradise festivals, which took place at Jaarbeurs in 1967 and 1968. Organised by the anarchist provo movement Volte, these festivals marked the very beginning of what would later grow into today's Lowlands. Based on dozens of interviews, photographs and unique archive material, the book brings to life the rise of a new generation of music lovers, freethinkers and cultural innovators and their lasting influence on Dutch festival culture.

Festival, book and exhibition: a summer full of history
Parallel to the festival The Flight Revisited and the book launch, the exhibition From Flight to Lowlands will take place at TivoliVredenburg from Friday 22 August to Sunday 14 September 2025. This exhibition shows in a narrative way how a group of anarchist youngsters from Utrecht laid the foundations for Dutch festival culture in 1967 and 1968, with the support of the municipality, in the middle of a still well-behaved and bourgeois Utrecht. Visitors discover who performed, how the festival came about and why it ceased to exist after two editions. There will be various public activities during the exhibition, including guided tours by Patrick Bakkenes on Saturday 23 August and during Open Monumentendagen (Heritage Days) on 13 and 14 September. The opening of the exhibition will take place on Friday 22 August, including a performance by The Op-Sound, who were also at the first Flight in 1967.