IT MUST rank as one of the North’s smallest music festivals, but MarshFest, on Saturday, July 22, has more heart than most.
This year the family-orientated event featuring original, cover and tribute bands is supporting the work of The Welcome Centre in Huddersfield, which runs a food bank and crisis centre.
Confirmed acts for the day range from a line-up of 13 local and Northern bands – including Vagabound, Flock of 3, Fishing for Compliments, The Boo Sutcliffe Band and Volume 11 - to Hathor, a troupe of belly dancers.
MarshFest, now in its second year, is organised in association with Marsh Blues Club. It takes place in the grounds of the Ukraine Club, Edgerton Road, from noon until late.
As with most contemporary music festivals, it will also offer children’s entertainment, craft and artisan food stalls – not forgetting a licensed bar – and is designed to be a day out for the whole family as well as a showcase for local music and performing arts talent.
Emma Greenough, manager of the Welcome Centre, says it’s hoped the festival will raise more than £2,000 for the charity, which last year supplied 143,000 meals in 9,000 parcels to South Kirklees families in crisis.
But it’s not just the food bank that will benefit from the event. As Emma explained: “We also have a support worker to provide advice. We don’t want to become a dependency service, ours is a crisis service. We support people to find their way into housing, for example; we set up reading groups to help with literacy; and offer advocacy services. We say we are giving people a hand up as well as a hand out.”
Last year around 400 people attended the festival, raising £1,400 for charity. This year organiser Marcus Henfrey is hoping to double the numbers. “This is the second festival but we are in this for the long term,” he said, “and we’ll be supporting the Welcome Centre in the future.”
The event is split into two sections, with outdoor entertainment in the grounds until 9pm, at which point the festivities will move into the Ukraine Club building, finishing at 1am.
Entry is £5 for adults (accompanied children under 15 go free).
