fileyfolk fileyfolk
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5th December 07
We shall not be producing a Filey Folk Festival in 2008.
The last four Filey Folk Festivals have proved to be very popular, but what may not often be realised by the general public is the amount of work that has to take place during the previous nine months or so.
Poppy and Alan Scott-Hallgate and myself are the organisers. We have plenty of supporters and helpers, especially over the weekend itself, but it is we three that have the ultimate responsibility of planning, trouble-shooting, and ensuring that it all works. This last festival was fraught with funding and organisational problems, the solutions to which luckily did not appear too obvious by the time we reached the actual festival weekend. The festival brochure, listing appearances, was in draft on my laptop for over two months pending last minute confirmations and changes. We were not sure of a major part of the programme until two hours before the start.
The continuing issues are funding, venues, and personal effort and risk.
We do appreciate the prompt, clear and simple grants that the Filey Town Council gave us. However, this last year some of the other funding nearly didn’t come and when it did it was either very late and/or tied to conditions. Public liability insurance requirements increase each year, and without it the three of us would leave ourselves personally exposed. We are also less and less inclined to tie up £1000 of our own money for eight months, simply to be able to confirm bookings, which is what we have been doing each year in order to comply with the Borough Council’s funding contribution.
I attended a recent festival funding seminar in Scarborough last month and came away with the distinct impression that a pub-based, free-entry, community-run festival is not what the funding bodies favour. However, Fileyfolk does not wish to turn our festival into a commercial activity simply in order to get hold of grant monies.
Filey pubs now seem to change landlords regularly and it is fraught with uncertainty for us to try to make arrangements with landlords in January, in order to book acts at a sensible time, for an event to take place in July. Landlords have also varied a great deal in their personal commitment to the concept of the weekend and in their practical co-operation.
Poppy, Alan and I have enjoyed producing the Filey Folk Festivals for the community but have decided that we have had enough hard work, worry and frustration simply for the sake of one week-end of pleasure and gratification. We do, however, sincerely thank all the performers, audiences, helpers, and all those who have supported us over the last four years.
Lex Austin at the Belle Vue (01723 513721) might do something.
ROBERT
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