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Spread the WOYD: Triumphant Festival Defies the Weather: 5000 People Flock to the Festival

The World on Your Doorstep, Hebden’s free World Music Festival, triumphantly defied misfortune and the climate to set Hebden Bridge rocking in Calder Holmes Park last weekend. It opened on Saturday morning with the Handmade Parade, an amazing display of colour, invention and fantasy, a community-based puppet parade organised by the arts group HEADS and Thingumajig Theatre. Hebden Bridge has never seen anything like it. As 2 elderly visitors from Pontefract told one of the volunteers on the gate, “We were sitting in a café looking out of the window when suddenly we saw the parade coming past. We couldn’t believe it. First one float, then another, then another. It just kept on coming. We’ve never seen anything so fantastic. It was just wonderful.”

They followed the parade into the park and thoroughly enjoyed their day. They said, “So much work has gone into it. Well done.”

The triumph of this magnificent opening, however, could not conceal the fact that the festival was almost over before it began. The roof of the main stage, erected on Friday, collapsed during the night and was a total write-off, sitting unused in the park like a wreck throughout the weekend, an ugly and desperate reminder of what might have been. But the gods that delivered this blow along with the lowering skies and the rain had not bargained on the fortitude of festival organiser, Dave Boardman, and his intrepid crew. While recovery work was taking place, the Calder Valley Voices sang in the open field and Pepperjam performed in Fee Sharples’ food tent. By 4 o’clock, a marquee had been transformed into a main stage and the bands were up and running. Luckily for the festival organisers and the festival goers, while the main stage bands were out of commission, the acoustic tent became the main attraction, and was overflowing with patrons. This was to continue throughout the weekend.

Sponsors

Hebden Royd Town Council has been our main saviour this year kicking the festival off with a £6,000 grant. Community Foundation for Calderdale jumped in with £5,000, Calderdale MBC provided £2,000, the TUC have donated £1,000 and we've been getting small donations from others as well as the funding efforts of the Trades Club.

A big thank you to everyone that has donated to this years festival, the World On Your Doorstep could not happen without this support.

Also thanks to local businesses whose adverts you'll see throughout the festival programme... Thanks to Peter Vardy at Calderdale Council and Jason (the town warden) for support throughout the occasionally chaotic lead up to the festival.

The volunteers

Many people have helped and are busy during the festival making sure it goes as smoothly and trouble free as possible. They're generally wearing festival crew and steward T-shirts.

The festival could not happen without the dedication and support of the volunteers, so a big thank you to all of you.

Now the world really is on our doorstep... town turns out for puppet parade

A TOWN centre exploded into a riot of colour with a weekend of fun-packed community action.

A puppet parade saw drums beat and hundreds waltz through Hebden Bridge for a two-day world music festival with exotic food and tunes laid on to keep residents young and old entertained.

Even the sun managing to make an appearance from time to time.

The Handmade Parade, organised between community arts organization Heads and Thingumajig Theatre, saw more than 300 people dressed as frogs, fairies, hissing swans and pirates march through town accompanied by music and cheering crowds.

Community groups and schoolchildren had spent months deep in planning and the proof was certainly in the parade.

Stilter (Andrew Kim) and Heron by Kerith Ogden. Photo by Nigel Hillier.

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