Village Festival 2008
News - Iron Age Children - Gallery - Press Cuttings/Posters - Archaeology Tour - X Factor Heat Results - Initial Festival Letter
News from Festival 2008
Great Bowden Festival Weekend 2008
The August Bank Holiday weekend saw Great Bowden taken over by the Festival Weekend. One passer by on the Fleckney – Market Harborough bus said that she had been through the village on the Saturday afternoon and saw what looked like a ‘perfect, traditional village fete’ and that is certainly what the festival committee were hoping for.
The weekend opened on Friday night with the bells of St Peter and St Paul’s ringing for 30 minutes. This was followed by a walk round the village bounds – with 24 walkers setting off, though three (two adults and a labradoodle) failed literally at the first fence which defeated the dog. That particular team retreated to the cricket pitch to watch the villagers’ v the village cricket team challenge.
Saturday morning and amazingly, the sun was shining. Fantastic. The helicopters arrived on time at 1030 and the Fete opened with the parade of hounds at 2pm – though the bookstall had been doing a roaring trade most of the morning.
The stalls, from tombola, through soft toys, crafts and bottles were all kept busy. Other highlights included a traditional Punch and Judy, great work from the Heritage Society and of course, teas provided by the WI. Our vicar was very agile in his role as goalie and it’s fair to say no-one gave him any half hearted shots. I am sure he had his fair share of bruises on the Sunday.
Saturday evening was the final of the Junior X Factor competition held in the church. With standing room only, we were given the most amazing show by our talented local youngsters. The overall winner was Lizzie Turney (11-14s) who sang Memories and had her family, friends, the judges and quite a few of the audience in tears with her own interpretation of this classic. Daniel Carpenter on the cornet (11-14s) was runner up and in third place was singer Arthur O’Donovan (under 11’s). The age group winners were: 15-18 Alex Carpenter (pianist), Lizzie Turney (singer) and Tyler Smith (under 11s). The event has proved so popular that it has sparked the formation of a new youth choir called the Great Bowden Recital Youth Trust Choir and more than 30 young singers have signed up. Although there was no charge for entry, a collection at the door (on the there is no such thing as a free lunch, or indeed concert, as people left raised almost £240.
Thanks to all those who gave up their time to organise this contest and also to those who donated prizes and trophies.
On Sunday, our artists provided a magnificent display in the village hall and our heritage team also moved indoors with a superb DVD. The day’s events included carriage rides – again fantastic and a treasure hunt. The bookstall continued to do business and the barbecue was also out on both days providing burgers and hot dogs to keep us going. A Songs of Praise was held on Sunday afternoon and again, the WI did the village proud with teas in the church.
Monday was a much lower key day, with our artists and heritage display holding the fort.
The festival team would like to thank all those who assisted us in making the weekend such a success.
The final event in the 2008 Festival Calendar was the dinner and dance on the 20th September. This was a fabulous finale to the festival year.
Iron Age Children
Heritage Group News from the Festival Weekend
Sandpit archaeology is always popular. The children entered the 'rather square' roundhouse with its frontage designed by Jean Clarke and then found the sandpit with real archaeological pieces buried within. After instruction they used real tools to do the excavating and then identified what they had found with the help of pictures. As usual we had one or two children who wanted to dig up absolutely everything that was buried and one or two who wanted to keep the "finds". With a little persuasion they re buried the finds for the next person to have a go.
We had lots of costumes in a variety of sizes this time thanks to the hard work of Sue Creighton and the spear and shield persuaded even the boys to have a go at dressing up. The result was some rather charming pictures of the children. We do have some costumes in adult sizes and our ambition is to get whole families to dress up and pose for a family group photo. We may have to increase our powers of persuasion to achieve this next time.
Report compiled by Rosemary Culkin August 2008 - click to enlarge
Gallery - Village Festival 2008
Great Bowden from the Air - taken at the Village Festival weekend 2008 by Bruce White - click to enlarge
Punch & Judy at the Great Bowden Village Festival 2008 - click to enlarge
Festival Pictures - click to enlarge the above pictures
Festival Finale Pictures
Press Cuttings & Posters
Pancake Race - Sunday 3 Feb - Village Festival 2008
Leicester Mercury 5/2/2008 - Harborough Mail 7/2/2008 (click picture to enlarge)
Harborough Mail 7/2/2008 (click picture to enlarge)
FESTIVAL FINALE POSTER
Archaeology Tour
Great Bowden Archaeological Tour - National Archaeology Week 2008
Full report compiled by Rosemary Culkin - please click to view
Click to enlarge photos - Archaeological Tour of Great Bowden - July 20th 2008
X Factor Heat Results
X Factor Heat Results - Great Bowden Festival 2008
Heat 3 Results
After a total of nearly 20 hours of listening to a great variety of over 115 local young musicians, the judges have now heard all of the entrants to the Junior X Factor heats and the finalists are known.
The judges said “There are some outstanding musicians in the local area whether singers or instrumentalists. For us, this is less of a competition but is a showcase of the tremendous array of talent that Market Harborough has to offer – made even more impressive by the young age of many of the competitors.”
So, congratulations to all of the following who came top of their heats and will are therefore finalists. The names appear in alphabetical order and not in the order of merit.
During early August, each of the finalists will be contacted in writing when they will be provided with details of rehearsal times and arrangements for the final.
For those of you who did not quite make the finals this time, we urge you to keep practicing, keep performing and come back and enter again in the next Junior X Factor in 2010.
Heat 1 Finalists – Under 11 Years
Lucy Astbury Voice
Zoe Callow Voice
Isobel Edwards Piano
Holly Jane Grimshaw Voice
Arthur O’Donovan Voice
Tyler Smith Voice
Kiara Tooms Flute
Heat 2 Finalists – 11-14 Years
Elliot Bale Drums
Greg Burns Drums
Daniel Carpenter Cornet
Lizzie Turney Voice
Heat 3 Finalists – 15-18 Years
Alex Carpenter Piano
Huw Edwards and Eliot Whitelaw Guitar, Voice
Katie Rose Parker Voice
Posy Sterling Voice
Some of the most impressive runners-up have received a surprise wild card pass into the finals too. These finalists are:
Wild Card Finalists – All Ages
James Hamill Violin
Rebecca McHugo Voice
The X Factor Final promises to be a fantastic evening – it is part of the Great Bowden Festival Village Fete on Saturday 23 August. The Fete opens at 2pm and the X Factor final starts at 6pm in St Peter & St Paul Parish Church, Great Bowden. All awards, category winners and overall winners will be announced and presented at the Finals. Entry to watch the final is free – so make sure you bring all of your family and friends!
Initial Festival Newsletter
GREAT BOWDEN FESTIVAL 2008
It has become a village tradition to hold a festival in Great Bowden every four years.
2008 is a festival year. The Festival begins in February and a series of events will take place throughout the year. The purpose of the festival is to celebrate the village. We hope that the festival will also raise some money for village charitable causes. The village hall refurbishment and the village sign both benefited from contributions made following previous festivals.
The members of the 2008 Festival Committee are:
Matt Jones, Bruce Gillanders, Kim Deane, Jill Appleton, Deb Hale, Pat Oakley, Andrew Cartwright, Anne French, Jan Swatridge, Lynne Wilson
We will be delivering a year planner soon. This will have all the events of the Festival on it together with details of a host of other events that will be happening in the village during this year
The Festival opens, as is traditional, with a Pancake Race on Sunday 3 February followed by other events through the year including Old Time Musical Hall in February, Wine tasting , Junior X Factor competition, Gardens Open Day etc.
There will also be the Festival Weekend over the August Bank Holiday and the Festival will culminate in a Dance in a marquee in the grounds of Great Bowden School on 20 September.
We look forward to seeing you at some, or all, of the events.
Best wishes
The Festival Committee
Village Festival Wall Planner - download