FROME FESTIVAL RETURNS WITH A STA R - LIT P R O G R A M M E
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he Frome Festival returns this year for its 20th Anniversary special between July the 2nd and the 11th, with an array of outdoor events and another host of star-performers. Following last year’s coronavirus cancellation, the organisers have put together a programme that guarantees an exciting (and Covid-safe) ten-day extravaganza.
will appear, featuring singing, dancing, veils, swords, drums and multiple instruments. As usual, there will also be the Art Trail and the everpopular Hidden Gardens, where hundreds of visitors, often from far afield, descend on the private gardens of Frome residents.
Creative Director Martin Dimery explains: “We No Frome Festival would be complete without its decided to run a number of live performances on the star names: The Government’s Covid “road map” Ecos Amphitheatre, next door suggests all indoor venues to the Merlin Theatre on the will be able to open to capacity “We decided to run Frome College site. We will be audiences by June the 21st, a number of live installing a large roof over the just in time for the July 2nd performances on the stage to ensure performers are opening. If all goes to plan, Ecos Amphitheatre, kept dry. Audiences may have The Lightning Seeds will open next door to the to brave the elements, but it the Festival at the Cheese Merlin Theatre” hasn’t stopped Glastonbury!” and Grain on Friday 2nd July.
There is a new venue to the Frome Festival - Marston Park. This will be opening its gates to day and evening visitors and presenting a wide variety of musical artists performing under a canopied bar, or around a camp fire, overlooking the spectacular surrounding scenery between Frome and Tytherington. The Festival will also host some wonderful free entertainment around town with intervention opera and dance performances popping up, “flash mob” style, in the town centre on both Festival Saturdays. On Saturday the 10th, in Victoria Park, a free and fabulous Turkish extravaganza ‘Chalguh Chengi’
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THE LIST FROME
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Included in the Ecos /Merlin programme are performance by top class rock, jazz and fusion artists like Jonny and the Baptists, The Fabulous Red Diesel, Sonic Silents and Rob Heron and the Tea Pad Orchestra along with cult comedians Paul Foot and George Egg. The Silk Mill will also be hosting outdoor events in their courtyard with some exceptional musical names including Iain Ballamy and John Law.
