ROTW Seeks Venue for 2013

Organisers of Rhythms of the World, the world music festival held in Hitchin each July, are currently seeking a new venue and ask interested landholders to contact them.

Event organisers were informed in mid September that the owners of Hitchin Priory, where Rhythms of the World has been held for five years, were no longer prepared to host festivals in their grounds for business reasons. Gill Hannington, Chair of the charity’s Trustees, said: ‘After several meetings of the organising Committee, we have decided to seek an alternative venue for Rhythms of the World in 2013 and beyond. We believe we owe it to the thousands of people who attend the festival each year and the 800 or more volunteers who freely give their time, to find an alternative home for what we all believe is an amazing community event.

‘Whilst we are grateful for the many offers we have received from venues outside Hitchin, we are extremely keen to keep the festival in the town if possible - it has been held here since 1992 when it first began. We have been doing our own research into potential sites and are currently in discussions with a few landowners, but recognise there might be some hidden gems in and around Hitchin that we don’t even know about! As a registered charity, we are keen to keep the ticket price for future festivals as low as possible, but we also know we were incredibly fortunate to have secured the Hitchin Priory site free of charge for so many years. We realise it may not be possible to secure a free site in the future and would encourage any interested landowners to get in touch with us.

‘Once we secure a new venue, the volunteer team will have a huge amount of work to do to get the festival up and running in time. However, at that stage, a number of the artists will already be confirmed are we are 100% committed to making this work. All we need now is a suitable site. Ideally we are looking for somewhere in the region of 20 acres, with good access routes and that will create as little disturbance as possible for the local residents. We are confident there is a site out there that would be perfect to host Rhythms of the World and hope the landowner will get in touch’.

Anyone interested in knowing more should call 01462 420782, email [email protected] or contact us through our Facebook and Twitter pages.