A 14-year-old child was among eight people killed following a crowd surge at a music festival in Texas during a performance by rapper Travis Scott.

A 16-year-old also died in the disaster at Astroworld Festival in Houston on Friday, the city’s mayor Sylvester Turner told a news conference.

The other victims included two 21-year-olds, two people aged 23 and a 27-year-old, while the age of one victim is unknown.

Twenty-five people were admitted to hospital and 13 are still receiving treatment, including five under the age of 18.

Mr Turner said it was “a tragedy on many different levels” and that it is too early to draw conclusions about what went wrong.

Officials declared a “mass casualty incident” during Scott’s headline performance at the festival on Friday night.

Some of the 50,000-strong crowd “began to compress towards the front of the stage” while the rapper was performing on the opening night, authorities said..

Scott, who founded the festival, stopped multiple times during his 75-minute set after spotting fans in distress near the front of the stage, and asked security to help people out of the crowd.