WHEN big acts such as Van Morrison, Eric Clapton, John Hiatt and J. J. Cale said they couldn't make it, and Al Green, Robert Plant, Lenny Kravitz and James Blunt pulled out, Peter Noble decided to book the festival he'd always wanted Byron Bay to be.

The East Coast International Blues & Roots Music Festival kicked off with Los Lobos, Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, Buddy Guy, Damian Jr Gong Marley, Yothu Yindi, Jamie Cullum, the Skatalites and David Gray in a line-up that represents the history of roots and popular music, from gospel to blues, country, folk, reggae, Cuban and rap.

Noble, co-organiser with Michael Chugg and Glenn Wheatley, travelled to Cuba, Jamaica, the United States, Mexico, Thailand, Cork, Dubai and Berlin to hand-pick the eclectic line-up.

"Blues hasn't had a leading act in the last decade," says Noble, "and its audience is finite and largely working class, so we had to open it up to other genres."

Last year the festival added the pop band REM and edged out Adelaide's world music festival, WOMAD, and the summer youth festival Big Day Out to win the Robert Helpmann Award for best contemporary music festival.

"I picked REM because they had the right viewpoint and political stance, and Midnight Oil for the same reasons," Noble said.

But the success has come at a cost; the huge numbers of tourists are putting a strain on the local community, and the festival has outgrown its site. Organisers are expecting more than 70,000 at Red Devil Park this weekend, and they plan to buy their own site in the area for future events.

"Locals complain about the crowds sometimes but I say: 'What's wrong with cultural pilgrims? They come and enjoy and spend in the tens of millions of dollars'."