The August Bank Holiday weekend is suddenly looming very large indeed. Less than a week to go and you could well be finding yourself in Yorkshire with all of your festival needs still not having been met. If you don’t fancy wall-to-wall electronica then Bradford University’s Infest is probably not going to be your bag. Equally, the increasingly corporate and corpulent Leeds Festival may not be for you, especially if you don’t want to find yourself knee-deep in addled adolescents for an entire weekend. Why not then set the controls to north by north-east and travel the twenty odd miles from Bramham Park into the Hambleton Hills and arrive in the royal Forest of Galtres and the festival which takes its name. Galtres Festival has defied the recent economic and meteorological meltdown which has impacted so adversely upon many other similar events and now finds itself standing loud and proud on the cusp of its eight annual outing. It’s darned good value too, with the feelgood factor of doing its bit to promote local food and drink, and the whole thing being run to raise money for charities. What’s not to like?
So what do you get for those English pounds? Well, the organisers promise three days and three nights of beer, cider, food, fun and music in regal surroundings. For those to whom such things are dear (that’ll be most of us then) there are more porters, strong ales, blondes, pale ales, session bitters, ciders and even lagers than you could care to shake a rhythm stick at. There will be Yorkshire puddings of course, hog roasts, Honaloochie-boogie breakfasts, organic glitter candy floss (what? Ed.) and paellas. Put that alongside the more traditional festival fare of burgers, meatballs, hot sarnies, boozy chocolate shots , and then to keep you the right side of heart attack, we are promised healthy shakes and smoothies. In true keeping with its Norman heritage, the festival also offers a tented medieval village, all manner of crafts and activities, and even the threat of a dragon. The fun continues across a range of big tops, little tops and spinning tops hosting fun and games aplenty, storytelling, drama, theatre and generally all round wholesome family entertainment.
But what about the rock ‘n’ roll you may well ask? With two main and three marquee stages, they’ll be featuring a whole host of locally produced talent that will include the ever delightful Holly Taymar, former Seahorses frontman Chris Helme and that fabulous fiddler Sarah Horn. Further up the bill, Ash celebrate their 20th anniversary on the main stage on Saturday night, so expect a party.
They are preceded on Friday by Messrs Shelley, Diggle and the rest of Buzzcocks, while Sunday sees the dandy highwayman himself, Mr. Adam Ant who will undoubtedly stand and deliver. You can then throw in The Guillemots, festival perennial Billy Bragg, Seth Lakeman, Simon and Oscar from Ocean Colour Scene doing it the acoustic way, and the quietly marvellous Ellen and the Escapades for very good measure.
We’ll be there to capture the whole thing, and do you know what? We can’t wait.
