Tenterden Folk Festival 2009

 

 

 

Friday 2nd to Sunday 4th October

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a hectic few months plans for this year’s Tenterden Folk Festival are now coming together and the inevitable problems with an event of this size have mainly been resolved.

 

 

 

crafts, street stalls and music sales:

The popular craft fair will, as usual, be held in the Town Hall with more stalls in the High Street, on both Saturday and Sunday.  We will have a selection of very high quality craft stalls ranging from jewellery to hand painted cards and pottery to woodturning.  The street stalls will include highly colourful clothing, hand made fudge and much more.  Several of the stallholders are fellow members of Produced in Kent.     

 

 

 

The music fair has been relocated to the Main Hall of Tenterden Junior School, near the top of Recreation Ground Road, and we are very grateful to the head teacher, Chris Dodge, for his co-operation and support.  The normal venue for the music fair for the last few years has been the barn at the back of the Woolpack Hotel but this is now the home of the town’s popular boxing school so was not available.  Using the school hall now offers us a chance to expand the number and variety of music stalls and we have already added a luthier from Eastbourne who will be displaying his individually hand made guitars and other stringed instruments.  Most of the regular stall holders will also be there including Hobgoblin, Talking Elephant, Thrift Music and Hedingham Fair.  We are also planning to have displays of Morris dance in the school car park to cope with the increasing number of teams attending the festival.

 

 

 

Morris and other folk dancers:

Tenterden Folk Festival has always attracted dance sides from all over Kent and Sussex and many have attended the festival virtually every year since it started 17 years ago.  This year our dance co-ordinator is Gordon Newton, who helped to revive Rochester Sweeps Festival and Faversham Hop Festival and is still very much involved with the Sweeps Festival.  Gordon has worked hard to bring some new dance sides to this year’s Festival and has confirmed teams from Cheshire, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Berkshire, Essex, London and Surrey as well as Sussex and Kent and even Slovakia.  These teams include some of the best Morris sides in the country as well as Molly dancers, Appalachian dancers, May Pole dancers, clog dancers, Hoodeners and teams which perform dances from Europe.  Most of these teams will take part in the traditional Saturday afternoon procession as well as dancing around the town over the weekend.  With over 45 dance teams which alone could be over 1000 people, this should make it the busiest and most colourful weekend Tenterden has ever seen.      

 

 

 

For those who may not know, Hoodening is a centuries old custom, mainly from East Kent.  It involves small groups of people, traditionally men and boys, touring local village pubs and private house parties in the four or five days before Christmas, to perform short plays on the theme of death and resurrection.  The plays are normally accompanied by rather a lot of beer drinking and money is usually collected, originally to fund the beer but now more often for charity.   The plays are often topical and political and always very relevant to the audiences.

 

 

 

Dance sides confirmed for Tenterden Folk Festival 2009 include;

Annies Fantasies     ~ Essex

Berkshire Bedlam    ~ Berkshire

Bishop Gundulfs Morris ~ Kent

Borderline    ~ Berkshire

Bullnose Morris ~ Essex

Cinque Ports Morris ~ Kent

Dacre Morris ~ London

Dead Horse Morris ~ Kent

Frog Island Morris ~ Kent

Gong Scourers ~ Kent

Harwich Morris ~ Essex

Hunters Moon Morris ~ East Sussex

Invicta Morris ~ Kent

Kits Coty Morris ~ Kent

Knockhundred Shuttles ~ Hampshire

Loose Cannons ~ Hamphire

Loose Women ~ Kent

MacLennan Scottish Dance Group ~ Kent

Mad Jacks Morris ~ East Sussex

Maenads ~ Kent

Marlings Morris ~ West Sussex

Minster Mayhem Maypole and Morris Dancers ~ Kent

Morena Slovak Dance Company ~ Slovakia

Offcumduns ~ Kent

Old Palace Clog ~ Surrey

Oojah Kappivy ~ East Sussex

Pump House Clog ~ Hertfordshire

Pretty Grim Morris ~ Suffolk

Priory Morris ~ Essex

Ravensbourne Morris ~ Kent

Rising Larks ~ Essex

Royal Liberty Morris ~ Essex

Sandhurst Primary School Maypole Dancers ~ Kent

Shalesbrook Ladies Morris ~ East Sussex

Shinfield Shambles ~ Berkshire

St Clement Clog ~ Kent

Stockport Morris ~ Cheshire

Tanglefoot Appalachian Cloggers ~ Kent

The Wild Hunt ~ Surrey

Wolfshead and Vixen Morris ~ Kent

Woodchurch Morris ~ Kent

Woodvale International Folk Dance Group ~ Kent

Wychling Hoodeners ~ Kent

 

 

 

Book now:

To buy your tickets, book your craft fair or music fair pitch, place an advert in the enlarged souvenir programme or if you would like to be otherwise involved in the Festival contact us now.

 

Festival information:

More details of Tenterden Folk Festival 2009 guests, accommodation and camping are now being posted on our website at www.tenterdenfolkfestival.org.uk.

 

To receive our regular email updates send an email to info@tenterdenfolkfestival.org.uk with "add to festival news list" in the subject box.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Last updated 6th August 2009

Copyright © Tenterden Folk Festival 2009