Festival Gardens

CHELSEA MCGUFFIN & CO LE COUP

Wednesday 17—Sunday 28 May

Adnams Spiegeltent

It’s fight night at the circus!

Le Coup brings you the finest contenders to fight for your attention at this headline circus show. From fire breathing to daring aerial feats, tap dancing to acrobatics. It’s time to grab a drink, place your bets and pull up ringside for a fight like no other!

Tickets £26, £24, £22, £20 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

CIrCUS

With the arrival of the iconic Adnams Spiegeltent is also the legendary Festival Gardens bar, with delicious drinks and tasty food you can really soak up the Festival atmosphere.

This year’s highlights include fantastic circus Le Coup, raucous Québécois folk band Le Vent du Nord, and a late night programme of the hottest new music acts.

The Band Stand

Thursday 18–Sunday 21 & Thursday 25–Sunday 28 May Festival Gardens

Beautiful evenings of alfresco tunes, The Band Stand returns with the best young music-makers bringing you beats to sink your beer to. Full line-up to be announced at nnfestival.org.uk

Free MUSIC

The Adnams Spiegeltent is generously sponsored by

Sponsored by

Fancy a night at the circus?

Chelsea McGuffin gives the low down of what to expect at Le Coup

What three words best describe the show?

A raucous vaudevillian rollercoaster ride… sorry that’s four!

What will people feel?

Le Coup is really funny – so as well as being completely amazed by some seriously kick-ass circus skills we reckon you’ll have a good chortle too.

Also you might be on top of the world, or not, if the act you place your bet on becomes king of the ring!

How is modern circus different from traditional circus?

This show is actually the opposite. It’s is a tribute to funfairs, travelling troupes and the showmen and women of yesteryear. Le Coup creates a visceral vaudevillian world in which acrobatics, circus and live music entwine for a scintillatingly rousing entertainment experience.

What other work have you made?

We’ve made hit shows Cantina and Scotch and Soda, which have sold out shows at the London Wonderground and played many seasons throughout the UK and Europe including Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Why does so much circus come from Australia?

Australia is lucky enough to have gained a lot of respect both nationally and internationally for their high level of circus and innovation in the art form.

Circus takes many years of practice and Australia is lucky enough to have youth circus schools in most states which offer a welcoming place for all to get involved in the creative world of circus from a young age. We also have a long history of traditional circus performers who have shared their skills and knowledge for many years to circus stars of the future, all of which is on display and shining bright in Le Coup

vINCENT GAMBINI THIS IS NOT A MAGIC SHOw

Wednesday 17 May, 10pm

Adnams Spiegeltent

Forget everything you know about magic and magicians. Now remember it all again.

Possibly the first of its kind, This Is Not A Magic Show is part performance-lecture, part deconstructed showbiz, and part magic tricks that leave you, like, omg.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MAGIC

Sponsored by PAUL O’DONNELL

DIA-BE AT-ES

Thursday 18 May, 10pm

Adnams Spiegeltent

Paul is a Type 1 Diabetic, and has been for 28 years. Paul is also a DJ, and has been for about 5 months.

In Dia-Beat-es he cross-fades between the two in this mega-mix of ‘sweet sweet music’ dedicated to the carb counting druggies (insulin) like him.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

PE rFOrMANCE

Jasdeep Singh Degun

Thursday 18 May, 8pm St Peter Mancroft

Virtuoso sitarist Jasdeep Singh Degun is joined by an eightpiece band in music from his acclaimed debut, Anomaly. Uniquely skilled as performer, composer and collaborator, he brings the beauty and spontaneity of Indian tradition together with the rich counterpoint of western classical music and modern rhythmic ambience.

Tickets £22, £18, £15, £10 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

Music

SADIQ ALI THE CHOSEN HAr AM

Friday 19 & Saturday 20 May, 7.30pm

Workshop: Saturday 20 May, 2pm Norwich Arts Centre

The Chosen Haram deals with themes around sexuality, faith, addiction and connection. It tells the story of two queer men and their chance meeting through a dating app, portraying the highs and lows of their relationship and the barriers they face, both social and cultural, in seeking happiness and personal fulfillment.

Performed on two Chinese Poles this emotionally candid yet heartwarming story unfolds with gravity-defying tricks and extraordinary movement.

The performers will be delivering a Chinese Pole workshop on Saturday, a great chance to try out this exciting circus discipline.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50 workshop tickets £5 workshop ages: 16+ CIrCUS

Jason Parr

BrOKEN SPOKE

Friday 19 May, 7pm

The Drill House, Great Yarmouth

Broken Spoke is a uniquely Norfolk spoken word night showcasing local talent. A dynamic and fun night out, breaking the traditional boundaries of poetry, spoken word and music.

Donations on the door, pre-booked tickets encouraged CABArET

Presented by Out There Arts

NEIL BRAND

L AUrEL AND HArDY

Friday 19 May, 7.30pm

The Corn Hall, Diss

Dramatist and composer Neil Brand tells the touching story of the world’s greatest comedy duos. Culminating with two of their best silent short films.

Tickets £15

MUSIC

Presented by The Corn Hall, Diss

ENSEMBLE & GBSR DUO MIrrOrS

Friday 19 May, 8pm

St Andrew’s Hall

12 Ensemble (strings) and GBSR Duo (percussion and piano) explore music’s obsession with death, in a programme of heavenly and hellish visions by five composers working between classical and non-classical genres.

Mica Levi Lonely void, Love Fausto romitelli

Flowing Down Too Slow

Laurence Osborn

TOMB! (world premiere)

Brian Eno / Harold Budd

Ambient 2: The Plateaux of Mirror

Tickets £24, £20

U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MUSIC

Laurence Osborn TOMB! Co-commissioned by Norfolk & Norwich Festival, Kings Place, Cheltenham Festival

Sponsored by

Crossing boundaries

Festival music programmer James Hardie on why

12 Ensemble & GBSR Duo is unmissable

I’m James and I’m Music Programmer for the Festival. I work with artists to devise performances, and this one with 12 Ensemble & GBSR Duo has me really excited. It’s going to be an extraordinary evening of spine-tingling music-making from the very best in the business. It’s one for you adventurous music-lovers out there!

British composer Mica Levi’s seductive soundtrack for Under the Skin (2013) is up there with the most creepy or evocative film scores, like The Shining or Blade Runner. Levi uses microtonal movement and pitch-altering techniques to create a shimmering, unnerving soundworld fit for an alien.

Italian Fausto Romitelli was a curious character, drawing influence from psychedelic rock and techno, Francis Bacon and Marcel Proust, to make the distorted, hallucinatory works that made him a seminal figure despite his short life. Flowing Down Too Slow meshes electronic and acoustic sounds to make dirty harmonies and trippy sequences.

Laurence’s Osborne’s TOMB!, created especially for this concert, is a work written partly in admiration of older music, partly in grimace. Old musical forms and structures are jolted back to life and zombiefied as time winds down. I loved Laurence’s Coin Op Automata performed at the Festival by

COMPLINE BY C ANDLELIGHT

Friday 19 May, 9pm

Norwich Cathedral

The Girl Choristers, Lay Clerks and Choral Scholars of Norwich Cathedral Choir sing the ancient monastic office of night prayer in the stunning candlelit surroundings of Norwich Cathedral, including music by Anna Lapwood and Jonathan Dove.

Free entry, no booking required

MUSIC

NIHILOxICA

Friday 19 May, 10pm

Adnams Spiegeltent

Get ready for the dark, otherworldly sounds of Kampala’s Nihiloxica. Three percussionists, one kit drummer, and an analog synth player – the band harness traditional Ugandan Bugandan drumming and mix it with techno to tear apart the dance floor.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MUSIC

Sponsored by rAGrOOF TEA DANCES

The legendary Ragroof Tea Dance returns to the beautiful Adnams Spiegeltent – a cornucopia of dancing delights.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

Manchester Collective in 2021 and I can’t wait to hear TOMB! for the very first time here in Norwich.

East Anglia’s own Brian Eno defined the ambient genre, and Ambient 2, made with Harold Budd in 1980, is an iconic and timeless work. Rearranged here for live acoustic instruments by George Barton and Siwan Rhys, this 40 minute work will take you to a higher, blissedout plane. We’ll have the performers on the floor of the hall, with audience enshrining them on all sides to enjoy a collective, meditative experience.

DANCE THrOUGH THE DECADES

Saturday 20 May, 11am

Adnams Spiegeltent

Don your finest party wear and join us to dance your way out of the ballroom and in to the disco.

VINTAGE HOLLY wOOD

Sunday 21 May, 11am

Adnams Spiegeltent

Channel your favourite screen idol and honour the heyday of Hollywood glamour as we waltz you through a whirlwind afternoon.

DANCE

ALFA MIST

Saturday 20 May, 8pm

St Andrew’s Hall

Alfa Mist is a British musician, producer, song-writer and MC based in Newham. His music mixes hip-hop and club tropes with jazz improvisation. He describes his music as ‘Dark, alternative jazz with elements of hip-hop and soul’.

Tickets £22, £20, £15, £10

U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MUSIC w. H. LUNG

Saturday 20 May, 10pm

Adnams Spiegeltent

Manchester’s synth-pop powerhouse W. H. Lung are fresh off a 2022 Festival circuit – including playing the legendary William’s Green stage at Glastonbury. Think Donna Summer meets Kraftwerk. Their album Vanities delves into an electronic music hole, experimenting with synthesizers and falling in love with pop music.

Tickets £16 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MUSIC

Sponsored by

BRITTEN SINFONIA

MUSICAL EVErESTS

Sunday 21 May, 5pm

St Andrew’s Hall

Britten Sinfonia reveals music written by British composers in 1953 which scaled dizzying artistic heights – perhaps their crowning achievements – and yet is rarely heard today.

Arcangelo Corelli Concerto Grosso No 2, Op 6

Michael Tippett Fantasia Concertante on a theme of Corelli

Elizabeth Maconchy Symphony for Double String Orchestra

Joseph Phibbs New work (world premiere) william walton Finale from variations on an Elizabethan Theme

Tickets £35, £30, £25, £15, £10 U18/YoungNNF £7.50

MUSIC

Presented by Britten Sinfonia