When you think of millennial and Gen-Z music fans, you probably associate them more with Billie Eilish than Antonio Vivaldi. But Candlelight Events is bridging that gap.
Bringing contemporary sounds to historic UK venues illuminated by thousands of glowing LED candles, it offers events that transcend typical tastes.
Take its Taylor Swift-themed night, where Swifties can experience a string quartet’s unique take on the pop superstar’s biggest hits in a romantically lit church setting. Similarly, its Tribute to Coldplay night sees songs like Clocks and Fix You take on a whole new life.
“It’s a case of trying to introduce classical sounds to a younger millennial sort of audience and get them to come to these beautiful venues,” explains founder and creator Josh Singh, whose vision was reflected in Eventbrite’s TRNDS 2024 report – more than half (52%) of eventgoers love listening to different types of music and discovering new genres.
With high repeat business, Candlelight Events then seeks to introduce this audience to more traditional sounds with events like Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and The Best of Hans Zimmer.
“The buzz of seeing hundreds of people engrossed in the music and the surroundings makes all the hard work worthwhile,” Josh says.
He transitioned into events after working in banking, and with a few years of experience in the live music concert industry under his belt, he launched Candlelight Events in 2021. Noticing a trend for candle-lit events, he was further inspired by a Spanish company with a similar concept. “I just thought, well, why not have a UK company that does this?” he says.
Setting up in Bristol, he soon began hosting events in the South-West England region before travelling to other cities, including London, Oxford, and Bournemouth. He now has a core team of around 20 employees and has partnerships with recruitment agencies across the country to help staff each regional event.
However, during this expansion, Josh has always placed the highest priority on the quality of musicians, choosing to keep costs down in other areas to ensure these enchanting experiences remain accessible.
“We’re constantly looking at quality,” he explains: “A lot of companies will use freelance [musicians] because it’s a lot cheaper to do that. But we’ll spend extra money to pick out the crème de la crème of musicians. Then we know they’ve worked together for many years and played thousands of pieces together, so when we give them a programme list to play, it comes naturally to them.”
Noting how tickets are affordably priced (between £9 and £40), he adds: “We don’t have big shiny offices in London. We try to focus on keeping the overheads low, purely so we can pass that saving on to the customer.”
Moving into 2025, Candlelight Events has designs for shows in Manchester, Nottingham, Leeds, Derby, and Swindon and is eyeing some European destinations. However, for Josh, customer experience will remain key to success.
“We’re constantly brainstorming and playing with ideas,” he says. “How can we make it a better experience? Could it be through using dry ice or mood lighting? We are looking at orchestras as well and some bigger venues, just because we know that the demand is there.”
As such, Josh is also looking to capitalise on the popularity of Netflix’s Bridgerton, launching a new event campaign in the tourist hotspot of Bath, where much of the show is filmed and close to where most of Josh’s team is based.
It’s a smart idea – the hit period drama is designed for today’s millennial and Gen Z audiences and ranks among Netflix’s 10 most popular English-language series of all time. And just like Candlelight Events, its soundtrack reimagines contemporary chart hits with classical sounds.
“In a meeting, Bridgerton came up as one of the main topics. We were in talks with a new venue in the Bath area, and we thought, why not?” Josh says.
“I’ve now been assigned the task from my project managers to go away and listen to all the Bridgerton music, so that’s what I’ll be doing over the next few days,” he laughs.
As we’re sure Lady Whistledown would agree, dear reader, this will be quite the soirée.
