Frome festival – ‘one to remember’

This year’s Frome Festival has been hailed as “one to remember” by festival organisers as high ticket sales, a jam-packed programme of over 200 events combined to make it one of the best festivals in its 14- year history.

The festival enjoyed excellent weather for almost the entire 10 days and was accompanied by excellent ticket sales at the box office. And with many events completely sold out and nationally acclaimed headline acts like Paul Merton, Paul Chowdry and Seann Walsh appearing, organisers are hailing it a bumper year.

This year being the 75th anniversary of the Wizard of Oz film, people including many families gathered at the Cheese & Grain on Sunday dressed as Dorothies, scarecrows, lions, tin men, the wizard – and even flying monkeys and a yellow brick road.

They may have been short in number for breaking the current Guinness World Record of 446, but 233 Frome adults and children made a colourful festival spectacle and broke the Frome Festival record for the largest number of people dressed as story book characters.

As this year’s festival drew to a close, members of the Frome Festival committee were full of praise for the public support they received in making 2014 a year to remember.

“We were absolutely delighted with the line-up this year,” said Martin Dimery, the Festival’s creative director. “And it was great to see that not just the big names and visiting performers pulled in the audiences. Many of our locally-based artists attracted a lot of attention too.”

Festival chairman, Bob Morris, is delighted with the success. “It went very well indeed. This has to be as good if not better than any of the previous festivals and we are pleased with the 200-plus items on the programme.

“Once again, much like last year, we were blessed with the weather which really helps create a positive atmosphere. The only shower we did have on the first Saturday was not even a problem as the decision to have the festival feast by the Cheese and Grain paid off as people went inside when it started raining and went back outside when it passed – so we managed to get that right!

“As with any festival and one of this scale it is hard to keep everyone happy, but on the whole it has been a huge success and it has been enjoyable for everyone involved. We’ve had lots of favourable comments.

“I have found that many of the lesser-known acts have massively passed expectation and been fantastic entertainment. The quiz also proved a hit with over 20 tables sold and it was played in the right chummy spirit, with an intense edge, which made it a great evening.”

The festival got off to a flying start with gallery openings and events all over town drawing big audiences. A tapas bar at the Silk Mill drew huge crowds eating wonderful Spanish food in what felt like Spanish temperatures.

The Food Feast also benefitted from the good weather that continued throughout the festival. Events at ECOS were all packed to capacity. Hansel and Gretel – a fairytale opera drew large audiences and wowed the audiences at Cooper Hall.

Festival chairman, Bob Morris added, “All the months of planning and hoping and waiting have been  rewarded. A huge thank you to everyone who came and joined us here at Frome Festival 2014. Truly a year to remember!”