Business and pleasure, that most glorious of mixes.<\/p>\n
This weekend, Sabrina and I travelled to the Ribble Valley in Lancashire in the north of England for a couple of days promo and brainstorming regarding the Summer Days Festival in Clitheroe. Of course we managed to fit in a football match and a little wine tasting. Why not?<\/p>\n
I love the Ribble Valley. My pal and festival partner, John Tyrrell introduced me to it several years ago whilst we were working on an unrelated festival which was ultimately doomed due to the worst rainfall that this country has ever had dumped on it. That was a record year for rain apparently. Although it didn\u2019t affect our lives as much as did recent events affected the residents in the picturesque village of Whalley (pronounced Wall-E).<\/p>\n
Whenever in the area we always pop into The Whalley Wine Shop to meet up with friends. It\u2019s for our brainstorming sessions you understand (Yeah right says Sabrina). This weekend\u2019s conversation, however was dominated by recent tragic events and we listened to heartbreaking stories of last Boxing Day, just two days after we were last there, when the town flooded and half of the villager\u2019s homes were inundated with up to four feet of water. It was so very, very sad to hear these stories and my heart goes out to everybody affected.<\/p>\n
On Sunday morning we had the pleasure of visiting a care home for people with learning and communication difficulties. John, Paul and the others live in a beautiful terraced Edwardian house; six friends with varying degrees of disability living together with their carers as one big family.
\nJohn is a superb drummer and a big 80s fan and he loves Spandau, especially John Keeble. I was asked if I wouldn\u2019t mind popping round to say hello and see him drumming. I guess they couldn\u2019t get John Keeble \ud83d\ude09 Nevertheless, he was proud that he had an audience and I was proud of him in return.
\nWe had the most amazing time and it was touching to see how excited they were when I invited them to be our guests at the festival. Well, one has to return the hospitality.<\/p>\n
The main reason for travelling to Lancashire was to attend The Grabby\u2019s at The Grand Theatre in Clitheroe.
\nNow, The Grabby\u2019s is like Britain\u2019s Got Talent but involving four schools that are local to the area. I\u2019m sure you know the drill; the winners of the earlier stages get to perform one last time and then an overall winner is chosen. This year\u2019s Grabby\u2019s saw raised money for Friends of Serenity, The Solomon Project and
\nCancer Research.
\nThere are many people involved in this project not least the tireless Steven Lancaster who has helped to make The Grand Clitheroe\u2019s main community hub. All involved have given up their time to nurture, encourage and provide a platform or a stage in this case for young talents to show what they can do. Not only does this event give confidence to these young kids but it also gives us the chance to \u2018discover\u2019 the next Adele, the next Dynamo, the next Coldplay or the next
\nIsidora Duncan in little Tilly\u2019s case.
\nI was very proud to be invited to this event to meet up and chat with these young artists. And I so enjoyed being able to offer them an appearance at Summer Days. The look on their faces was priceless.
\nEven though an overall winner is chosen, in my eyes they are all winners. They all followed their dream. And they all made it this far.
\nBest of luck to every one of them, that\u2019s what I say.<\/p>\n
Steve x<\/p>\n