Key dates and events :
Saturday August 31 from 12 noon until 2pm: AGM and 2024 Fest Launch. To be held in Woolpit Institute, refreshments and sale of tickets for the 4 events.
Sunday September 1 at 4pm in St Mary’s Church: As part of our Festival Launch Weekend, a concert with The Keld Ensemble and Soloist Sarah Williamson. Doors open at 3.15. Tickets £10.
Friday October 4 in Woolpit Village Hall: Rosie Ashe presents her “Adorable Dora” a tribute to a national treasure Dora Bryan. Doors open 6.45pm for 7.30pm start. Tickets £15
Saturday October 5 in Woolpit Village Hall: The New West End Jerseys with a tribute to Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. This event will include a Lasagne and Salad Meal all for £20. Doors open at 6pm, the Show commences at 7.30pm after the sit down meal. For this event the tickets are limited to 120 so please do not delay purchasing.
Sunday October 6 in Woolpit Village Hall: Our very own Last Night of the Proms Show with Prometheus Orchestra and featuring the magical voice of Christina Johnston. Doors open at 6.45pm for a 7.30pm start. Tickets £20 for a rousing finale to celebrate 50 years Woolpit Festival and Music Week.
At the AGM and Festival Launch on September 4 2022 at Woolpit Institute, Festival Director Nick Foster addressing the meeting gave this moving tribute to David Cordon:
It is with immense sadness that we announce the sudden death of David Cordon. David was instrumental in establishing and enhancing our festival after Eileen Jones “Music Weeks” had set up a strong base of interested people and volunteers. Taking over from Eileen in 1988 David formed a supporters group, organised some very successful fundraising, established a bar and dress code for all events and introduced a logo – all to make the festival appear as a professionally run event. He was chairman and Director for 10 years before passing on the chairman’s role to concentrate on running the events as director which he did for another 6 years, overall 16 years dedicated service to Woolpit Festival. In that time he used his contacts to bring some illustrious names to Woolpit – John Julius Norwich, Janet Suzman, Sylvia Sims, Ludovic Kennedy, Jenny Agutter, Richard Bake, Tim Piggott- Smith and Antony Hopkins. Musically we had the Academy of St Martin’s in the Field, Cantabile and the Allegri String Quartet. An impressive array of talent to be hosted in a small Suffolk Village!
David was also strongly committed to the Drama Club where over the years he directed a number of plays that would not have been out of place in the London theatre scene. And latterly he worked with us in the festival – over the last three years directing two Alan Bennett plays from the Talking Heads series each year.
David had a commanding presence, an impressively professional approach to everything he did (his garden has always been a stunning hit of the village open gardens) and through his talented direction of many plays and his effective stewardship of the Festival, he brought a huge amount of pleasure to our village. He will be terribly missed.
Just to let you know that Stanley, Paquita and Caroline have confirmed the Talking Heads production will go ahead – “as David would have wanted it”