Bewdley Festival | Festival of the Arts 2026Festival of the Arts - At A Glance

2026 Festival of the Arts - At A Glance

Here's a quick summary of who will be joining us for this year’s 2026 Festival of the Arts...

Musical highlights include the voice of Squeeze, Glenn Tilbrook, Liza Pulman of Fascinating Aida fame, classical music from the phenomenally successful Carducci Quartet and also the Young Pianists of Bewdley, and to get the Festival party started we have the incredible Deborah Bonham Band.
From the world of comedy we have Alfie Moore returning to the Festival with his popular Radio 4 series It’s A Fair Cop, and we’re delighted to welcome Alistair McGowan for a 3 in 1 night of fabulous fun and music.
Joining us from the literary world will be Liz Hyder - who will be presenting both a writing workshop and author talk - and British & Irish writer Kit De Waal.
We are again blessed with the brilliant historical insight of Lesley Smith who is portraying Emma Hamilton, and Max Keen who will be running us through the long history of Dudley Castle in his own inimitable style. We are also delighted to have Dr Gareth Williams talking about Fool’s Gold - The inside story of the Herefordshire Viking Hoard.
Then joining us for some fascinating conversation will be the BBC’s Stuart Maconie, whose latest book looks behind the scenes of the Beatles, John Robb from the world of Punk Music, BBC Gardeners’ World’s Adam Frost, the irrepressible Reverend Kate Bottley, and from the political world Baroness Natalie Bennett, Green Party member of the House of Lords and well known sustainability champion.
The art world was much saddened at the recent loss of local artist Claire Spencer. Not only is she the focus of our month-long Art Exhibition at Bewdley Museum, Claire’s son Ben Bowling will also be talking about her life and work.
For this year’s Exhibition On Screen, we have also managed to bring the art film of the year - Turner and Constable - to this year’s Festival.
And in conclusion we are delighted to have the support of local organisations The Severn Valley Railway and West Midlands Safari Park who will be telling us all about the remarkable work they do in two separate discussions entitled Steam + Safari.