Saturday, June 25, 2022

SPECIAL BRIGG FESTIVAL EVENT WILL CELEBRATE 100 YEARS OF MUSIC & DRAMA


Brigg is to mark a major milestone for local music and drama in style.
The North Lincolnshire Music & Drama Festival's 100th event involving Spring classes being judged at local venues has been delayed since April 2020 due to the Covid emergency.
But now a special FREE-TO-ATTEND concert has been arranged for Saturday, July 16, 2022, to mark the centenary in style.
A Celebration of Festivals Past and Future will be held at The Vale Academy, Atherton Way, Brigg, DN20 8AR, from 2pm.
Audience members are being invited to take picnics along with them to be enjoyed from 4pm once the programme has been completed.
Courtesy of the society organisers, Brigg will be marking "100 years of dramatic and musical achievements" with performances, picnics and reminiscences.
Tickets can be obtained through the Eventbrite online booking system.
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Brigg Blog reported in March this year that the 100th festival - delayed since 2020 - would not be taking place.
However, we stressed that the organisers "are working towards a celebration being held later in the year."
The initial festival took place in 1900, and it went on to become an annual fixture.
However, there were enforced suspensions allied to the two world wars and also for a period during the 1950s before things got back on track.
Until its closure in the early 1990s, Brigg Corn Exchange - a large and ideal venue - hosted the festival classes.
Since then, local schools and churches have been used as venues.
The music-loving Elwes family (major land and property owners and providers of various Lords of the Manor) were instrumental in establishing the annual festivals.
There are also strong links with famous composers Percy Grainger and Frederic Delius through the traditional folk tune Brigg Fair.
Joseph Taylor, of Saxby-All-Saints, sang it at Brigg Music Festival, generating major interest well beyond this area.
The piece inspired Delius to compose his Brigg Fair (An English Rhapsody) in 1908.
Performed in many classical music concerts down the decades, it featured in The Last Night of the Proms at the Albert Hall in London last September.
Many Brigg Blog followers will recall nervously taking to the stage at Brigg Corn Exchange, and later venues, to perform poetry and music to be judged.
It was a source of family pride if a certificate was gained and the presentation was photographed by the local press.