prophetic flip-flops

with the news just in that Britain is in for a BBQ summer, I am hoping that we haven't quietly put the kybosh on the prediction by printing our sunshine barcode flip-flops on the cover of our booking brochure. It certainly can't be a worse summer than the last two years, but it would be great to repeat the weather we had for the 2005 Festival.

Thanks belatedly to Gwilym Simcock for bestowed the name sunshine barcode on the Festival's logo when he was here last year.

ukulelescope

found out about an hour ago that the performance by the UOGB on 15 July has sold out, beating itself to become the new record holder for fastest selling show in Lichfield Festival history. Returns only from now on. Only a very few tickets have been held off sale, which we will be releasing much closer to the time. Last few tickets remain for their other performance on 14 July.

bafa at lfa

tonight is the annual dinner of the Lichfield Festival Association, and the guest speaker will be Stewart Collins, current Chairman of the British Arts Festivals Association, and Artistic Director of Henley Festival, artsfestival:chelsea and Holder's Season in Barbados.
Stewart visits Lichfield to talk about the vital importance, the extraordinary diversity, and current health of British festivals. As BAFA Chairman he's best placed to know, but he's also right in the middle of BAFA's spring road shows and has been visiting Presteigne, Bath, Leeds, Edinburgh over the last fortnight with Cambridge and Canterbury next week. BAFA is also visiting Birmingham at the end of the month for a Tourism Management Institute day conference.

Those sharp eyed among you will have also realised that Stewart (wearing his Chelsea hat) and I have been working together for the last three years on the Confluences project that culminates at both our festivals this year (as well as at Salisbury's).

I have also just remembered that I heard about the sad death of Humphrey Lyttelton just as the 2008 LFA Dinner finished. Touch wood...

shiraz @ decißel

found out late yesterday that Shiraz, our film project with new music composed by Sarvar Sabri from last year's Festival, has been accepted into the decißel Performing Arts Showcase. This year decißel takes place in Manchester between 15-18 September, and while we are still waiting to hear which slot the Sabri Ensemble will be given, the opportunity to perform in front of promoters from a huge variety of venues and festivals across the UK will increase the profile of both the Sabri Ensemble and the project, and hopefully lead to a strong Spring to Autumn 2010 tour. Information about the Sabri Ensemble's performance at decißel can be found here.

one & other

This summer London's Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square will be given to the people. The idea behind Antony Gormley's One & Other is for a different person each and every hour for 100 days to stand on the Fourth Plinth resulting in a living portrait of the UK. Any one living in the UK can be involved, and it is an extremely rare chance to be a part of something extraordinary. The West Midlands has been allocated only 217 places out of the possible 2,400. I'd encourage as many of you to sign up to be a part of this as possible.