Village Green 2010 line up announced

VILLAGE GREEN, the one-day arts-led free festival hosted by METAL, will takes place in Chalkwell Park on Saturday September 25th.

Following on from the huge success of the 2009 Village Green where it was estimated that around 20,000 people flocked to the park to enjoy the programme of events, METAL are pleased to announce acts and activities confirmed so far.

Supported for the third year running by Southend-on-Sea Borough Council, and the Arts Council England East, VILLAGE GREEN is a family-friendly event to celebrate a unique and diverse range of creative talents from Southend-on-Sea, and beyond. As you will see, this year is shaping up to be another fantastic, fun-packed and creative day full of music, theatre performances, film, interactive events, viral activities, and for the first time comedy. BBC Blast will be present, as will the Royal Opera House, and the Southend-on-Sea Borough Cycle Southend project to name but a few.

Southend-on-Sea Borough Council’s Executive Councillor for Culture, Councillor Derek Jarvis told longpier.com:

“Village Green is an exceptional event for the whole community and we are very pleased indeed to be supporting it again.

“There is a huge variety of terrific activities for all the family to see and take part in. It is a wonderful opportunity to enjoy and share in all kinds of artistic inspirations from local, national and international artists. Village Green is definitely not to be missed.”

This year Village Green will host four stages.  Carleen Anderson will be headlining the Metal-commissioned bespoke, and now design award nominated, main stage. Best known in the UK for her work with the Young Disciples, the Brand New Heavies, and Mercury Prize nominated in 1992, Carleen has since gone on achieve a highly successful solo career.

Spoken word artist Anthony Joseph will be performing with the Spasm Band. Regarded as spokesperson for avant-garde black Britain, Anthony has recently made a much talked about TV appearance on ‘Later’ performing ‘Ghost Town’ with Jerry Dammers’ Spacial AKA.

Another confirmed highlight is a Southend local with an international reputation – Snowboy. This world-reknowned percussionist will be bringing his mighty Latin Section band to perform an infectious set of afro Cuban jazz tunes.

Also featured on this stage is one-time Pipette Rose Dougall. Now a solo artist, Brighton-based Rose has received across the board critical acclaim for her single releases. An album, ‘Without Why’ (produced by Toku Chan artist Lee Baker) is due for release soon. One-time Belle Star Jennie Matthias heads up 1- Stop-Experience. Intelligent ska that deals with topical concepts, the band also features the Skip McDonald on guitar. Laura B and the Moonlighters will be providing some good time rhythm and swing, whilst local all-girl funk rock trio the Dirty Fairies will open proceedings.

Stage Two, the tent, will feature a host of spoken word, poetry, acoustic sounds and comic delights. So far confirmed for the tent are Southend-based arts collective Sundown Multi Media, who will be providing thought-provoking entertainment, whilst Quirkish Delight, Southend’s finest purveyors of improvised comedy, will pose those unanswerable questions. With a twist.

Stage Three, will be curated by Leigh Folk Festival. More activities about what they have planned are to be announced soon.

Stage Four, the film tent, will again feature screenings from the White Bus archive, animation, kids classics, and much more. This year the London Snorkelling Team will be appearing on this stage. The LST play short, sharp tunes that reflect a love of unusual instruments, wonky cartoon music, 1950s sci-fi exotica and cocktail jazz without the solos. Or fairly silly music played very sincerely. Live, the band are joined by The Perrett Brothers, who add hand-drawn overhead-projector animation to the tunes. And this year, for the first time, between 8pm and 10pm, this tent will be presenting an evening of comedy. More details to follow.

BBC Blast, the BBC’s youth creativity service will be at bringing their multi-media workshops to Village Green for the first time. From first-timers to emerging artists, Blast gives 13 – 19 year olds the chance to try out new skills, showcase their own work and find out more about working in the creative industries. Each year the BBC takes Blast out on tour, giving young people the opportunity to get some hands-on experience and training in a wide variety of free multi-media workshops. Last year, Blast engaged over 170,000 teenagers in face-to-face activities throughout the UK. BLAST will be setting up their impressive mobile creative centre, complete with digital workshop spaces and separate performance area, in Chalkwell Park from Thursday September 23rd. Over the next three days, teenagers with a passion for music, dance, film and fashion, will be able to take part in free workshops, using state of the art equipment to produce their own work, with advice and support from industry professionals, including BBC production staff. Some of the exciting workshops that on offer include:

* Backstage skills and performance workshops with professionals from Covent Garden, courtesy of Royal Opera House Creative Partnerships.
* Music: DJing, music technology, song writing and music production and creating ring-tones.
* Media: Film and video making, VJing, radio reporting and programme making.
* Art and design: Animation, gaming, photography and fashion design.

Sian Lord, Editor for BBC Blast said:

“The idea of being creative can be pretty daunting, if you don’t consider yourself to be particularly artistic. But in fact there’s some creativity in all of us and sometimes all you need is a bit of inspiration. BBC Blast is all about inspiring young people to explore their own creativity, through technology and interactivity.”

Workshops will be available throughout the day, and those interested in taking part should go the Blast website to sign up. Work created here can be uploaded to the BBC Blast website, while Talent Showcases will enable participants to show their new skills to family, friends and the public.

Elsewhere in the park, Forest Fringe, the micro-festival within a festival will also be present at Village Green, with what promises to be fun-filled viral activities for all. Having proved a huge hit at the Edinburgh Fringe for the past three years, Village Green is sure to be in for a treat.

There will be many other collaborators and artists involved in Village Green – Co-Exist Studios, Southend Young Creatives, Cycle Southend, Level-4 Magazine, Andy Barak-Smith, Simon Fowler, Rachel Lichtenstein, Simon Poulter to name but a few.

If you are interested in taking one of our 100 stalls for showcasing, selling or demonstrating your talent, creations, performance, participatory workshops or other works of art, please download the application form from the Metal website www.metalculture.com/villagegreen and return to Metal before Friday 4th June 2010.

CHECK OUT LONGPIER’S VIDEO COVERAGE OF THE 2009 EVENT