Music & Theatre feature:Layout 1
5/24/18
3:09 PM
Page 129
An evening to remember
A NOSTALGIC evening is on the cards on Saturday, June 30th, when a concert will be held at Banwell Village Hall, featuring Magenta, who were residents at the Bell Inn Folk Club in Banwell from 1978 to 1985. The evening is open to all and particularly to anyone who remembers nights at the Bell in those days. The venue was nationally known and hosted visits from many top acts such as Fred Wedlock, Jake Thackray, Roy Harper, Battlefield Band, Richard Digance, Dougie Maclean, Harvey Andrews, Martin Carthy, Bert Jansch and many more. The village Hall was used on a number of occasions by the club to put on larger concerts and it is hoped that the atmosphere of the Bell can be revived for one more night on June 30th. Magenta first formed in 1975 and played their own brand of original, mainly acoustic music throughout the UK and abroad until disbanding in 1985. The five members decided to get together again in 2009 and reunion concerts at the Blakehay and Playhouse theatres in Weston in 2009, 2011 and 2016 have been followed with further concerts throughout the South West. They released their fifth album Let it Fall in November last year. Tickets for the evening, which starts at 7.30pm and includes a bar, are £10 each, available from Mervyn (07970 100252) or Arthur (07970 525826).
Spring season
WRINGTON Drama Club’s spring production An Evening of Comedy featured three one-act plays by some of theatre’s finest and funniest writers, Alan Ayckbourn, Pam Valentine and Lynn Brittney, directed by Christine Parnham and Mark Bullen. Details: www.wringtondrama.club
MUSIC & THEATRE
Family-friendly folk festival
Ali George is due to open the Radford Folk Festival
THE Radford Folk Festival returns for 2018 with an impressive line-up of new and emerging talent and some well-known faces. A family-friendly, one-day festival by the side of the Cam Brook near Timsbury, Saturday, July 7th promises a relaxed atmosphere, great music, food and drink. The festival is due to open at midday with Ali George, a Bath-based singer-songwriter who has been compared to an early Cat Stevens. Other artists including Feryl Beryl, Frome’s Al O’Kane and Radio 2 Folk Awards nominees The Drystones are also booked for the afternoon before an open mic session gives way to an evening featuring Jez Hellard and the Djukezella Orchestra, Vervain and headliners De Fuego. Radford Farm, a 120-acre organic farm, is the venue for the festival. The farm rears Gloucester Old Spot pigs, Norfolk Black turkeys and grows a wide range of salad vegetables. For details about the festival, visit: www.radfordfolkfestival.co.uk – tickets are available from the farm: www.radfordmill.co.uk
www.radfordmillfarm.com Contact Paddy at pat@hillsidestudios.co.uk or patrick@hillsidestudios.co.uk
07857 572960 01761 479391 www.radfordfolkfestival.co.uk MENDIP TIMES • MAY 2018 • PAGE 129