Equinox Festival 2023

The Equinox Festival – Ross-on-Wye’s free world music and wellbeing event – is back for another year! This time there is even more music starting on Friday evening, 22 September.

Our pre-festival warm up evening will include street food and drink from 4pm featuring The Crab Shack and Fabioni’s Pizzas and drinks from local microbrewery, The Tap House, Vintage Mobile Bars and gin cocktails from Fizz Origin. Music will start at 5pm with talented local musician, Ed Brooking, on his ukelele followed by world class performances from 7pm with multi-instrumentalist and winner of Glastonbury’s 2023 Emerging Talent Competition, N’famady Kouyaté and his quintet. Headlining, former BBC presenter and DJ, Andy Kershaw, will entertain you with his own inimitable style of dance music from across the globe. Dance the night away or just sit back under the festoon-lit stretch tent and enjoy the performances.

Ease into Saturday with a Hawaiian Hula dance session at 11am, before the Arts & Crafts market opens at 12pm on Long Acre by the riverside with lots of lovely handmade items, jewellery, candles, beauty products and more.

Local wellbeing choir, the Border Belles, will kick the music off at 1.30pm and Forest Thump samba will perform from 2pm followed by a drum workshop under the stretch tent. If you want to take a breather, why not join in with Wye Valley River Festival’s yoga mandala workshop at 3pm and get involved in a gentle, movement-based dance performance? Later on, DJ Andy Kershaw will be back at 6pm for his happy hour of African, Caribbean and Latin dance music as the sun sets. Following this, enjoy Faith I Branko‘s incredible Serbian gypsy jazz performance before our incredible international headliners, The Turbans, bring the night to a close.  

Supported by Ross-on-Wye Town Council, Fibre Heroes, Rehau and part-funded by the UK Government through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

The UK Shared Prosperity Fund is a central pillar of the UK government’s Levelling Up agenda and provides £2.6 billion of funding for local investment by March 2025. The Fund aims to improve pride in place and increase life chances across the UK investing in communities and place, supporting local business, and people and skills. For more information, visit UK Shared Prosperity Fund here.