ARTS & CULTURE
Cornbury Estate in Oxfordshire, in the words of the event organisers: “Come to the wilderness to meet the world.” This year the event takes place on 3–6 August. The largest greenfield festival in the world
is Glastonbury. Hosted down at Worthy Farm since 1970 the first festival revellers were treated to free milk. Now the event has grown to host more than 170,000 partygoers and nothing stops them from having a good time. It’s the one event where wellington boots are the most important fashion accessory because there is an awful lot of mud. In fact, they are ubiquitous at Glastonbury. Shirley Bassey flew into the festival dressed in a sequined fuchsia pink dress and with her initials DSB encrusted in diamonds written on her wellington boots! D for Dame in case you’re wondering. The festival takes place from 22–25 June this year. The headlining acts are Radiohead, Foo Fighters and Kris Kristofferson. The Fringe festival is another genre that has
grown and grown. The UK hosts the largest of these in Edinburgh, and this year marks its 70th anniversary. The event will be held from 4–28 August. With 50,266 performances of 3,269 shows in 294 venues there are literally thousands of reasons to visit the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Every year thousands of performers take to the stage to present shows for every taste. The events include theatre, comedy, dance, circus, cabaret, children’s shows, musicals, opera, music, spoken word and exhibitions. This really is the festival with a fringe on top! For those of you who can’t make the trip up
to Scotland do not worry. England has a raft of Fringe festivals including Brighton (5 May–4 June), Hastings (over three weekends in September), Bath (29 May–14 June), and Stroud (25–27 August), to name just a few. For people thinking that the English are not so adventurous with their food there is the
www.focus-info.org
Lena Walton is a self-published author whose second novel Not Quite Gaza is due to be published this year. She also writes travel articles and travel stories set in exotic places such as The Galápagos Islands, Madagascar, Ethiopia and Mongolia.
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Bath Chilli and Chocolate festival. Held at the University of Bath (15–16 July), this involves science talks, growing tips, a curry cook off, a chilli con carne cook off, children’s entertainment, a lemon and doughnut eating competition for kids, live bands, hot wings challenges, gin bar, festival bar, cocktail bar, chilli and chocolate traders, and street food chilli eating competitions. To finish on a truly magical note there is a
very special festival down in the New Forest, the Fairy Festival (12–13 August). There will be plenty of fairy wings fluttering in the summer breeze here. Events include drumming workshops, hula hoop workshops, stilt walking, and enchanting fairies and dragons, making this a festival for fairies and elves of all ages. With such a diverse collection of festivals the
only thing to do now is decide which ones to head out to. Just don’t let the English summer rain on your parade.
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