Sidmouth International Festival 2003

The 49th Sidmouth Festival will feature top performances from the folk and roots music scene. There will be around 600 events over 8 days including international music and dance spectaculars, concerts, ceilidhs, workshops, processions, craft fair and a full children's festival.

This year's line-up includes, on the Arena Stage: Altan; La Bottine Souriante; Eliza Carthy; Flame! - a spectacular of English dance featuring, amongst others, the English Acoustic Collective, The Mellstock Band and the Grenoside Traditional Sword Dancers.

In town, the BBC Radio 2 Concert Marquee will be featuring Irish band Lúnasa, Northumbrian piper Kathryn Tickell and band; Galician stars, Berrogüetto; John Renbourn and Tony McManus; Flook; Malinky; Last Night's Fun; John Spiers and Jon Boden. There is also an exclusive premier of 'The Shamrock, the Thistle and the Rose' featuring leading Irish, English, Australian and Scottish performers: Niamh Parsons, Graham Dunne, Nancy Kerr, James Fagan and Alistair Hulett. Tom McConville, Pauline Cato and Terry Docherty join together to form The Great Northern Roadshow. There are also performances from Emily Druce, John Kirkpatrick, Archie Fisher, Les Barker and many more.

The Festival Dance House gives you the opportunity to dance from morning until night with leading ceilidh bandssuch as Token Women, Peeping Tom who are celebrating their 30th anniversary with special guests, Rodney Miller's Airdance (USA), Random, Bedlam and Whapweasel amongst others. For those with plenty of energy there are Global Dance Parties with Peatbog Fairies, Ti Jaz, Bayou Seco, Charanga Del Norte, Skokiaan and Meridian.

The World of Dance Shows on the Arena stage display rich dance traditions from all over the globe and continue to get bigger with a series of concerts throughout the week including two World of Dance Specials. The first one on Tuesday 5 August features the Lee Kyung Hwa Dance Company from Korea and the second on Thursday 7 August features the Yaroslava Song and Dance Folk Group from Russia. They will be joined by groups from Ghana, India, Poland, and the Pacific Islands plus some top UK dance teams.

The Festival youth programme has four workshop series (dance, music, song and theatre) leading to Festival performances throughout the week. The Children's Festival theme this year is 'Hats, Caps, Bonnets and Berets'. There are plenty of craft activities, fun and games, workshops and much more.

The workshops are for Season ticket holders only, and offer an opportunity to try out European dance, Cajun, Appalachian, Irish set, Dutch, Playford, Contra, Scottish, Clog Stepping or Beginners Ceilidh. You can also sing with the Festival Choir or West Gallery to be led by Dave Townsend. Instrumental workshops include fiddle, melodeon, guitar, bodhran, gamelan, concertina, accordion and percussion and so on.

A Season ticket for the whole week is the easiest way to see the Festival. It is a passport to ALL events but if you can only pop in and out of workshops then they do offer a Workshop Season ticket. These come in books of 5 for you to do with as you wish, use all 5 for yourself or share amongst your friends. They have also continued the extended range of Season ticket Family Packages and Day Season tickets.

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