Bath Festival

The Bath Festival returns this year kicking off with Party in The City on Friday 17th May.

The festival stays true to its original roots with a celebration of literature and classical music. The programme has also been designed to widen its appeal with most musical genres and cultural tastes being catered for. The culmination being the Finale Weekend, a foodie and music fest boasting headliners Clean Bandit and Van Morrison across the weekend of 1st and 2nd June.

Party In The City is a city-wide music celebration with over 35 venues (both indoors and al fresco!) open to all with free music sessions all night, with something promised for all tastes and all ages. The festival claims this is Bath’s biggest night of free music and has certainly grown in popularity across the years for bringing the city to life. With over 2000 performers live in one evening Bath is set to kick off The Bath Festival in fine form. The line-up is yet to be announced.

Peppered across the programme of talks, workshops and lectures there is also a programme for families with a Family Arts Day on Sunday 26 May, and BathIron host FireFolk in the Parade Gardens celebrating the art of blacksmiths.

But the main focus of the festival is to celebrate literature, books, and the arts. The programme is stuffed full of well-known titles, authors and musician across the classics, the mainstream and the more ‘leftfield’.

Total Guide has devoured the programme at some length to bring you our top 5 must see this summer.

1. Sara Cox, BBC Radio 2 DJ comes to Bath on Sunday 19th to share tales from her book ‘Until The Cows Come Home’ stories from her 1980’s Lancastrian upbringing. Smiley funny Sara is sure to bring the giggles as well as some northern nostalgia.

2. Prue Leith, GBBO host, writer and publisher returns to Bath to chat cooking, that programme, jjjj and her latest novel ‘The Lost Son’.

3. Countdown and The Apprentice star Nick Hewer chats to Alex Clark about his book My Alphabet, a memoire which is sure to delight and enthral.

4. Runners, triathletes, or wanna-be runners will be racing towards this event on May 25th when Ben Smith (Bristol based runner of ‘The Man Who Ran 401 Marathons In 401 days’), Vassos Alexander (writer of ‘Running Up That Hill’) and BBC Breakfasts Louise Minchin (Dare to Tri) convene to inspire you to follow in their footsteps.

5. Double bill treat from film critic Mark Kermode as he chats about his memoire ‘How Does It Feel: A Life of Musical Misadventure’ followed by being joined on stage by his rockabilly skiffle band The Dodge Brothers. Comes high recommended and will be at The Assembly Rooms on Saturday 18th May.

Check out the free paper programmes that are available city wide from retailers. Bookings can be made online or at the Box Office situated inside the Bath Visitor Information Centre.