Malvern Fringe Festival
The Malvern Fringe Festival is an arts festival (founded 1977) which takes place in Great Malvern, England. The main events of the Malvern Fringe Festival are the MayDay and the annual three day festival held in June as a fringe to the Elgar Festival. These are accompanied by musical and other live events throughout the year. The Fringe aims to be inclusive; bridging the generation gap by providing a varied programme of events for the local people of Malvern aimed at all ages.
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History
Malvern Fringe Festival was founded in 1977 by Adrian Mealing, a teacher in Malvern, in collaboration with Andrew Sleigh, Ian Fearnside and Phil Webb. It originated as a reaction to the Malvern Festival which was perceived at the time to be biased towards classical music and appealing towards a national and international audience. A further concern was the continued requirement for the local Council to underwrite the main festival and the feeling that the public expenditure could be more wisely spent. [1][2]
The founding aims of the Fringe were to produce a popular, varied programme of events for the local people of Malvern, to bridge the gap between the “us” and “them” in the arts and to “shake it up a bit in Malvern”.
The first year featured sixty events comprising of poetry, world music, folk, jazz, adult and children’s theatre performed under the banner of “Associated Events” due to the main Festival’s objections to the term ‘Fringe’, which they considered to be “outside” of the Festival. In 1978 to avoid confusion between the programmes for the two festivals, printed with similar designs at the main festival’s insistence, Adrian Mealing hand wrote “Fringe” on over 3000 programmes. [3] As the 1980s approached the festival grew into a four week event and the Fringe had established its own identity. Being centrally located between Hereford, Worcester, Gloucester and Cheltenham the Fringe had begun to draw wide audiences from over a 20-mile radius.
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By the 1990s Malvern Fringe Arts Ltd had become a registered charity. The Fringe programme had grown to a six week event and was attracting comedy and cabaret acts that were beginning to establish their reputations, including Eddie Izzard, Lee Evans, Jerry Sadowitz, Jim Tavare, Chris Lynam and a double act featuring Linda Smith and Mark Thomas, plus musical acts as varied as Gong, Left, Right and Centre, Juicy Lucy, Voodoo Queens, Bang Bang Machine, and Daevid Allen.
A complete departure from fringe style activities came in 1998, with the launch of the Great Malvern Recorder Festival, when hundreds of recorder players from all over the UK and beyond came to Malvern for a festival of recorder playing. Concerts were given by the world famous Amsterdam Loeki Stardust Quartet and others, and in 2000 the National Youth Recorder Orchestra held its first course in Malvern. After three such events, the Fringe returned to its concern for the population of Malvern at large who were not receiving any benefit from either the recorder festival or the Elgar Festival, which had recently been re-launched by William Boughton and the English Symphony Orchestra (ESO).
In 2006, in response to the perceived insular nature of the ESO’s Elgar Festival, the Fringe re-launched its three day festival in June, loosely based upon a theme of Elgar’s interests. One of the highlights of this festival was a bicycle race (cycling was one of Elgar’s keen interests) up the steep incline of Great Malvern’s Church Street. This event was supported by Commonwealth gold medallist Liam Killeen, who's from Malvern, and was won by Frenchman Arnaud Lenoir, who just happened to be passing and was shanghaied into taking part. The whole three-day festival was attended by over 5,000 people.
In the autumn of 2006 the Fringe launched a ‘folk weekend’ featuring Roy Bailey and Jez Lowe. If this venture proves to be popular it is planned that it will become an annual event.
Local Controversy
Despite an attendance of over 5,000 people the June 2006 festival has been the subject of much negative coverage in the letters pages of the local newspaper with one correspondent calling upon readers to petition the local Member of Parliament to halt any further Fringe activities. [4]
Notable Past Performers
Throughout its history Malvern Fringe featured an impressive array of performers, many of whom have gone on to become international stars.
Classical
- Amsterdam Loeki Stardust Quartet
- National Youth Recorder Orchestra
- Edwin Roxburgh and the Hendrickse Flute Quartet
Music
- 3 Daft Monkeys
- Daevid Allen
- Astralasia
- Amsterdam Loeki Stardust Quartet
- Bang Bang Machine
- Roy Bailey
- Bhundu Boys
- Caravan
- Lol Coxhill
- Fred Zeppelin
- Gong
- Gordon Giltrap
- Left, Right and Centre (featuring Nigel Kennedy and Caleb)
- Juicy Lucy
- Kroke
- Jez Lowe
- Loop Guru
- Moishe's Bagel
- Pete Morton
- Nominus Minstrels
- Rory McLeod and Tymon Dogg
- Ozric Tentacles
- Hazel O'Connor
- Pantagruel
- Prophets of Da City
- June Tabor and Huw Warren
- Tarika Sammy
- Barbara Thompson's Paraphernalia
- Voodoo Queens
- The Wurzels
Dance
Poetry
- Dannie and Joan Abse
- John Cooper Clarke
- Merle Collins
- John Hegley
- Adrian Henri
- Michael Horovitz and Stan Tracey
- Frances Horovitz and Pete Morgan
- Joolz
- Linton Kwesi Johnson
- Ian McMillan
- Dick McBride
- Roger McGough
- Gabriel Woolf
Comedy
- Rowan Atkinson
- Jo Brand
- Jack Dee
- Jenny Eclair
- Lee Evans
- Jeremy Hardy
- Eddie Izzard
- The Kipper Family
- Mark Lamarr
- Al Murray
- Jerry Sadowitz
- Linda Smith and Mark Thomas
- Mark Steel
- Jim Tavare