FrancoFolies move angers Quebec City mayor

The mayor of Quebec City is angry that the organizers of the province's largest francophone music festival are changing their schedule in a way that he says will hurt other events.

Les FrancoFolies de Montréal is usually held in August, but organizers want to move it up to June next year.

The president of Équipe Spectra, the private company that stages the festival, said there's more money to be made in June.

Alan Simard also said it would make it easier for his organization because the setup would be in place for its next annual event, the Montreal International Jazz Festival, held ever summer around Canada Day.

Simard said the time for "petty feuds" is over, and no one should be upset about the decision.

But Quebec City Mayor Régis Labeaume is fuming.

His city's summer festival usually takes place in the middle of July, and he expects many francophone artists won't want to come to Canada twice.

He also noted FrancoFolies gets public funding, and he will ask the government whether that's fair, because the money will end up in a private promoter's pocket if the festival richens itself by being held earlier.

"So he's gonna make a quarter of a million more profit — he's right. But the problem is it's paid by the governments," Labeaume said.

The mayor isn't the only one who's angry.

Charles Breton, who runs the small Festival de la Chanson de Tadoussac in the North Shore Quebec village, described the FrancoFolies move as "arrogant."

Next year, Breton's event will fall in the middle of the new FrancoFolies dates.

Breton said festivals in France co-operate more than some of those in Quebec. He predicted his festival in Tadoussac will be hurt by the move, and may even be forced to close down after being in operation for more than 25 years.