Tickets for the new ABBA concert series go on general sale today (Tuesday) through Ticketmaster ahead of the start of a long-term residency due to begin next May.
The ABBA Voyage concerts will feature avatars of the Swedish pop stars and be held at a custom-built, 3,000-capacity venue dubbed the ABBA Arena in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. The virtual foursome — who last played concerts more than 40 years ago — will be accompanied by a live 10-piece band.
ABBA Voyage kicks off from May 27, 2022 with shows staged five evenings per week plus two matinee performances.
Ticket prices for ABBA Voyage start from £21, with various options including general admission, auditorium and special dance booths.
Fans who pre-ordered the new ABBA Voyage album were able to gain priority access to concert tickets from Sunday, with a presale for registered fans launching yesterday (Monday). General sale tickets for dates until October became available at 10am today.
The innovative concert series has been welcomed by fans as well as industry insiders, bringing a ray of optimism after 18 months of challenges amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Comments from Ticketmaster executives show the project has been in the planning for years.
Doug Smith, Ticketmaster’s senior vice president of business operations, wrote on LinkedIn: “This has been a long time in the making! “I’m so proud to be part of the team working on this on sale. It is definitely one of my career highlights.”
Kevin Vahidi, Ticketmaster’s director of venues and promoters, responded: “We need this show in Vegas too! Fantastic!! :-)”
Gary Roden, Ticketmaster’s senior vice president of client development, added: “So pleased the secret is finally out about this. It is an absolute pleasure to be the ticketing partner for ABBA Voyage and a personal privilege to have been involved with the process for the last few years.
“Congratulations to the fantastic team at ABBA Voyage for getting to this point. I am also very proud of the work done by our team at Ticketmaster as we build towards releasing the first tickets to the global ABBA fanbase.”
While there were some complaints about Ticketmaster’s website being overwhelmed during the presale, the queue just after the on-sale began was just a few thousand.
The virtual ‘ABBA-tars’ were created with help from an 850-strong team from Industrial Light & Magic, founded by George Lucas, using motion capture technology. The band – now all in their 70s – will appear as they did at the height of their fame in 1979.
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