ENTRIES FLOODING IN TO BUXTON FESTIVAL FRINGE

PRESS RELEASE for immediate release March 23 2006

Buxton Festival Fringe (July 7-23) goes from strength to strength with last year's event featuring some 350 performances and an exciting diversity of arts from music to dance and theatre to exhibitions.

The largest Fringe Festival in England, this lively annual arts extravaganza runs alongside the official, opera-based Buxton Festival in July, but is a separate organisation with its own events and its own programme, available from June. At the time of going to press, entries are already flooding in. Martin Beard, who runs his own theatre company, the REC Theatre, and is also a venue manager has so far lined up 18 productions and 63 performances with stand-up comedy, children's shows (including Grimm's Fairytales and an open-air Alice in Wonderland), and from Two Friends Productions, Two Sisters, a Chekovian comedy starring Royal Shakespeare Company actors directed by Coronation Street star Chris Gascoyne. Watch out too for Young REC productions of Anorak of Fire, Don Juan and Two Gentlemen of Verona plus Taste Productions with The Magdalen Whitewash about Irish convent laundries in the 1930s and Where's Waldo?, a freaky spectacle summed up as 'Elvis meets Scooby Doo in the swamp'! With more comedy promised from MediaMedea and Crewe Lyceum Adult Drama Group, there is plenty to raise a smile at this year's Fringe.

Music is always strong and the programme includes orchestras such as the High Peak, Manchester Recorder, King Edward Musical Society of Macclesfield and the Amaretti Chamber as well as intimate events such as David Barnard and Nicola Mills's song recital and Angela Rawley and Anna Le Hair's summertime performance of Handel and Gershwin complete with strawberries and cream! Not surprisingly on his 250th anniversary, Mozart gets a look in with Laura Tanner presenting a Mozart Marathon and no less than two primary schools performing a new musical, Rap Around with Mozart.

The Fringe is spreading further afield this year with 15th-century music being performed by Aitone at St James the Less in New Mills and a comprehensive programme of events being planned at the Bookstore at Brierlow Bar. Add to this walks and talks plus exhibitions such as the traditional Pump Room Art and Craft Exhibition and Burbage Art Group's impressive annual display, and you can see why a decision has been made to produce a bigger programme than usual; last year it was published in full colour for the first time thanks to the generosity of design company, OB Design.

To find out exactly what is going on, check out the newly expanded website at http://www.buxtonfringe.org.uk or come to Buxton's Pavilion Gardens for Fringe Sunday, the Fringe's open-air concert and showcase of events on July 9, 4.30-7pm. The Fringe will also be having a float at this year's Buxton Carnival on Saturday, July 15th and there will be a special Fringe Club during the Fringe.

A charity run almost entirely by volunteers, the Fringe receives valuable financial aid from supporters including the University of Derby, Buxton, High Peak Borough Council and The Osborne Group. If you would like to become involved either as a sponsor, volunteer or Friend of the Fringe (thereby gaining a ten percent discount on ticket prices), please see the website.

During the Fringe, you can also pay a visit to the Fringe Information Desk next to the Opera House. This year's Fringe is shaping up to be even bigger than usual, so enjoy yourselves and don't forget, you can also support the arts by supping the ever-popular, specially brewed Fringe Beer!

FOR FURTHER INFO CONTACT BUXTON FESTIVAL FRINGE PRESS OFFICER: STEPHANIE BILLEN 01298 79351 Send message to Press