Olivia Dean will headline Milk + Cookies in Cape Town and Johannesburg in January

Olivia Dean, the London singer who won Best New Artist at the Grammys in February, will headline the third South African edition of Milk + Cookies in January. The festival named her on 23 October for Cape Town on 29 January 2027 and Johannesburg two days later.

Cape Town gets a new site again. After Ostrich Farm in 2025 and Kenilworth Racecourse this year, the festival moves to Sandringham Farm. Johannesburg stays at the Nasrec Expo Centre.

Tickets

Pre-registration is open now. A pre-sale starts at 10am on Wednesday, 28 October, and general sale follows on Friday, 30 October, through Howler for both cities. Entry is for over-18s only. Prices had not been announced by Saturday.

The rest of the bill

Dean joins four South African acts the festival had already confirmed: Jade T, Zee Nxumalo, Chelsea Sloan and Elaine. More artists, and the wider Milk + Cookies Music Week programme, will be announced in the coming weeks, the organisers say.

Why this booking matters

Dean's second album, The Art of Loving, came out in September 2025, and its single Man I Need went to No 1 in the UK and No 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. In February, the same month as her Grammy, she won four Brit Awards, including British Artist of the Year and British Album of the Year. Her 2023 debut, Messy, was nominated for the Mercury Prize.

She is also a different kind of headliner for this festival. The Canadian producer Kaytranada opened the first South African edition in 2025, playing to about 20,000 people, and the US rapper Gunna headlined in 2026. Organisers put combined attendance across the first two years at more than 50,000.

"People keep asking how Kaytranada, Gunna and Olivia Dean end up on the same bill," said Chase Freeman, the festival's head of marketing. "Never the same sound, always the same feeling. That's the only brief we've ever had."

Freeman said the South African editions had changed how the company works elsewhere. "We came here to put on a show and ended up building something with the people who live here," he said.

According to The Citizen, Dean is also booked for Lollapalooza India and Manila's LaLaLa Fest in the same season.