England’s number one-ranking brass band is among the musical guests at this year’s Prescot Festival.
Cheshire-based Foden’s Band—currently placed number two worldwide—has been making music for over a century and has proved itself a firm favourite with audiences in Prescot since the festival began in 2005.
But this year’s festivities open in swinging style with another return visitor, the much-loved swing orchestra Dr Jazz and the Cheshire Cats. They join the Liverpool Bach Collective, the Liverpool Phoenix Concert Orchestra, musical theatre company BOST and an array of other performers from across the North West in a 10-day programme between 17 and 26 June this year.
Local schoolchildren will have the chance to showcase their skills as part of Young Instrumentalists of Prescot and the second Primary Schools’ Choir Festival, while singers from across the region are invited to ‘Come and Sing’ highlights from Handel’s immortal choral work Messiah.
‘With live brass, big band jazz, choral, classical and light orchestral music all returning to the festival this year, we’re expecting our eighteenth annual event to have something for everyone,’ said artistic director Dr Robert Howard.
‘This year’s festival comes amid thrilling anticipation for the opening of the Shakespeare North Playhouse, just a stone’s throw from our main venue in the heart of historic Prescot,’ he added, ‘so it’s with tremendous excitement that we offer this celebration of community music-making to herald the beginning of a new era in the cultural life of the town.’
Full programme information is now online at prescotfestival.co.uk, and tickets go on sale on 1 May 2022 via the website or in person at Poco Coffee (30 Eccleston Street, L34 5QJ).
The 18th Annual Prescot Festival of Music & the Arts runs from Friday 17 to Sunday 26 June 2022 in the historic Lancashire town of Prescot, Merseyside.
Image: James Luxton of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral conducts the Prescot Festival Chorus in 2019 (Alan Humphreys Photography)
