Mercury Rev, and more for Wilderness Festival

Secret Garden Party, Midnight Masked Ball, & a special collaboration

By Scott Williams | Published: Wed 1st Jun 2011

Mercury Rev

Friday 12th to Sunday 14th August 2011
Cornbury Park, Charlbury, Oxfordshire, OX7 3EH, England MAP
early bird £99.50 adult weekend camping
Daily capacity: 10,000
Last updated: Wed 3rd Aug 2011

Mercury Rev lead the latest additions announced for the new Wilderness festival, set to be held at Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire from Friday 12th until Sunday 14th August.

Mercury Rev
Mercury Rev will make their only UK festival appearance of the summer, performing their seminal masterpiece 'Deserter's Songs' for the last time on this sell-out tour.

The Secret Garden Party festival joins Wilderness presiding over a late-night concept party on the Friday night. Titled 'Where The Wild Things Are', this will be the only other opportunity to catch the antics of the Secret Garden crew this summer. Jim Whewell, Secret Garden's Creative Director said, "We spent a couple of days up at Cornbury picking the exact spot for this party – it's an absolute gem and we can't wait to roll over to Wilderness and finish the summer in style."

The hosts promise to transform a forest clearing into a theatrical landscape of make-believe with the help of resident performers Tax Deductible, The Artful Badger and The Feast of Fools.

Londoners The Last Tuesday Society, will host their first ever headline show at a UK festival with a Midnight Masked Ball on Saturday night. Following Gogol Bordello's closing main stage show the festival site will be turned over to Viktor Wynd and his accomplices who will oversee a multi-tented extravaganza of weird and wonderful entertainments including ballroom dancing, late night story-telling, puppet theatre, processional bands, séances and life drawing classes.

Including headline shows from The Urban Voodoo Machine, a second performance from the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble and aerial displays from Empress Stah, the Ball promises to be a Balkan boogie carousal into the early hours of Sunday morning.

Mercury Rev, Fyfe Dangerfield of Guillemots, The Low Anthem and the previously announced Robyn Hitchcock will all be collaborating in a very special Sunday Night Songbook Finale with cult singer-songwriter and Wilderness Artist-in-Residence 2011, Daniel Johnston. Daniel Johnston's Sunday Night Collaborators will be performing a their late-night show under canvas.

The new names join a line-up including Antony and the Johnsons (and The Heritage Orchestra), Laura Marling, Daniel Johnston, Gogol Bordello, The Low Anthem, Dry The River, Guillemots, Toots & The Maytals, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Hayseed Dixie, chefs Skye Gyngell and Sam and Sam Clark from Moro, The Old Vic Tunnels, Tax Deductible Theatre Company, Factory Theatre, Bristol Natural History Consortium, Headspace and Boutique Babysitting. For the full details as available, see here.

The family-friendly Wilderness is being held from Friday 12th until Sunday 14th August at Cornbury Park in Oxfordshire and intends to bring together "music, food, learning, literature and rejuvenation".

Early bird adult weekend camping tickets are priced at £99.50. Early Bird family tickets (two adults, two children) are priced at £250, children aged 10 years and younger go free. To buy tickets click here.


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