Two planned stadium concerts by Ye, the rapper legally formerly known as Kanye West, have been formally scrapped after weeks of lingering uncertainty and public backlash over the artist’s history of hateful antisemitic and pro-Nazi rhetoric. The performances were scheduled to take place October 10 and 11 at St. Petersburg’s Gazprom Arena, and would have marked the largest live show by a Western artist in Russia since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Confusion over the shows began back in August, when Gazprom Arena officials publicly stated they had never signed a formal venue rental agreement with the event promoters, meaning the concerts could not go forward on their property. Local organizers Say Agency, a Moscow-based events company, initially said they were working behind the scenes to resolve the venue dispute, before ultimately confirming the full cancellation in an official statement posted to the Telegram messaging platform.
“With sincere regret, the Ye concerts in St. Petersburg will not be able to take place on the scheduled dates,” the organization wrote. “We will issue an official statement regarding the status of the project and our plans in the near future.” In addition to the contractual deadlock, Gazprom Arena also confirmed it had received hundreds of public complaints from members of the public about hosting West, whose long record of bigoted comments has sparked global outrage in recent years.
West has recently issued a public apology for his past hateful statements, attributing his offensive remarks to a loss of connection with reality brought on by his bipolar disorder diagnosis. But the apology did little to quell backlash in Russia, a country that suffered catastrophic loss from the 1941-1945 Nazi invasion during World War Two. Top Russian officials were among the most vocal critics of the planned shows: Maria Zakharova, spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, called the planned performances unacceptable and called out West’s well-documented glorification of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler.
Criticism intensified after it emerged that in 2025, West began selling merchandise printed with swastikas and released a song titled *Heil Hitler*, a reference to the Nazi salute used by Hitler and his regime. Pro-Kremlin pro-war bloggers also added their opposition, arguing that Russia should not welcome an American artist at a time when the U.S. continues to send billions of dollars in military and financial aid to Ukraine to defend against the Russian invasion.
This cancellation is far from an isolated incident for West, who returned to global touring earlier this year following a years-long pause of his live performance career. He launched his comeback with his first major U.S. concert in over five years in Los Angeles back in April, and has since held shows across Western Europe, including stops in Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands. But multiple planned performances across the globe have been scrapped due to backlash over his views. Last summer, West was set to headline London’s Wireless Festival, but he was barred from entering the United Kingdom, forcing organizers to cancel the entire event entirely. Planned shows in Poland, Italy and France have also been called off in recent months. As of Tuesday, West has not issued any public comment on the cancellation of his planned Russian performances.