Olaf Furniss is the co-founder of Wide Events, which hosts the Wide Days international music convention, the Born To Be Wide seminar/social evenings, the Off The Record youth initiative and in partnership with the Edinburgh Fringe, Made In Scotland Gigs.
The company is also spearheading Scotland’s music export initiatives and in addition to promoting the Scottish presence at ESNS, SXSW and The Great Escape, has developed a training workshop for music-makers and rights holders to become sync ready. Moreover, in 2022 Wide Events launched an initiative to develop collaborations with music professionals in Mexico.
An expert in music tourism, Olaf organised the world’s first international conference to bring together the two sectors and has hosted numerous workshops and panels on the subject. In 2023 he also launched the Music Tourist podcast.
As a journalist Olaf has reported for the BBC, The Guardian, Billboard, Musik Woche and I-Q, and he co-writes the Under The Radar column in the Scotland on Sunday newspaper, which is exclusively focused on emerging Scottish talent.
.