Preparations are under way to make next year's FolkEast festival extra special - to celebrate the event's tenth anniversary.
After a two-year wait, the festival returned this month with a spectacular weekend in the grounds of Elizabethan Glemham Hall in a reimagined streamlined, slimmer, spacious and Covid-secure way – with most of the original cancelled 2020 event's line-up taking part.
Co-directors John and Becky Marshall-Potter were delighted to welcome back some 6,500 festivalgoers to what has become one of the top choices on the folk festival calendar.
Following months of uncertainty, the couple decided to forge ahead, despite the lack of any Government cancellation insurance scheme at the time.
The two open-air stages witnessed memorable performances with many of the musicians not having played live together for over a year. There were stand-out performances from headliners Elephant Sessions, Afro Celt Sound System and Merry Hell.
Now following the success, the organisers are moving full steam ahead with the 2022 preparations.
Becky Marshall-Potter said: "It was just wonderful to open the FolkEast gates once more and witness the joy of both audience and performers being back where they belonged– celebrations don’t come much more special than that.
“There’s no denying it has been a stressful time. Even after the July lifting of restricted numbers of people at live events, we decided to keep the event smaller – so people felt safe and had no problem respecting each other’s space. Building confidence in festival goers was never going to be an overnight thing.
“It was a joy to reunite the FolkEast community who have been so supportive through the dark days, from generously donating to our crowd funder to taking part in last year’s Virtually FolkEast. We have been really touched by the positive feedback from festivalgoers who were so happy and ready to celebrate the return of the festival - it has made all the sleepless nights worthwhile.”
She said it was "all systems go" for August 19-21, 2022 with a landmark 10th anniversary event being planned.
Early Bird tickets go on sale October 1 - and ahead of that, those that attended and registered this year, will be able to apply for discounted 2022 tickets from September 1.
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