FOLK festival organisers will be playing it safe in Warwick when the live music event returns this summer.
Warwick Folk Festival bosses are determined the event will go ahead this year after last summer’s gathering fell victim to the pandemic.
The government’s schedule for a staged lifting of all the social distancing rules has a target of seeing the country fully out of all restrictions by June 21. The ‘earliest possible’ date falls three weeks before the festival is set to welcome folk fans – from July 15 to 18 – to its new site in the shadow of Warwick Castle.
If the roadmap delivers on time, event organisers up and down the country expect a deluge of interest in festivals in the UK.
But while a return to festival life is welcomed, organisers of Warwick’s 40-year-old festival understand music fans might be wary of taking things too fast.
Festival director Dick Dixon says striking a balance between family fun and safety could hold the key.
He said: “We feel that even if the restrictions have all been wiped away, many people will still want to feel safe and take things carefully until we’re all certain the situation has improved. With that in mind we are going to keep a lot of the safety measures we have got used to over the last year or so in place. We will have reduced numbers on each day and plenty of space in and around all the gigs. There will also be hand sanitisers and we’ll be working to ensure that those who want to keep socially-distanced are able to do so.”
The festival is also hoping to bring in an app allowing people to get their drinks from the bar without having to venture into the beer tent, and organisers have added an extra field to the site to allow campers to spread out. There are also plans for a giant screen to allow hundreds to sit in the open air to enjoy the music.
Festival chairman John Plumb added: “We’re as keen as ever to bring music back to the town and to inject a real boost into the local economy. But it has to be done in a way that people are comfortable with and so the emphasis will be on keeping things as safe as possible.”
The festival’s line-up incudes Show of Hands, Seth Lakeman, Spiers & Boden, and Nancy Kerr.
Visit www.warwickfolkfestival.co.uk for more details.
