Gloucester Guildhall make their annual Underground Festival a free event

After being short-listed in a music magazine's search for Britain's Best Small Venue, Gloucester Guildhall has decided to celebrate this accolade by making their annual Underground Festival taking place over the weekend of Saturday 24th and Sunday 25th September 2011 at Gloucester Guildhall, in Gloucestershire a free event.

The Guildhall hopes that this decision will help to provide a platform for new music in Gloucester with the event bringing unsigned and emerging bands to Gloucester.

Organiser Joe Schiavon said of the decision, "The nomination showed us that people in Gloucester obviously care about the venue, as well as music as a whole, so we thought we'd give them an opportunity to experience as many exciting breakthrough artists over the course of a weekend as possible. Obviously being nominated for such a huge award was a massive achievement for us and we are really indebted to everyone who voted. This seemed like the ideal way to give something back and say thank you for all the support we've received."

The line-up for the 2011 festival includes Morning Parade, Fixers, Ramona, Polarsets, The Suzikis, Trophy Wife, Entrepreneurs, Francesqa, Blitz Kids, Young Legionnaire, Holy State, The Computers, Stagecoach, Delta Alaska, and Nicholas Stevenson.

Free tickets will be allocated on a first come first served basis on both days of the festival and demand is expected to be high so festival-goers are being advised to turn up early. This event is for those aged 14+. Tickets were originally priced at £25 for the weekend, or £15 per day.

In an addition Gloucester Guildhall have teamed up with BBC Introducing, meaning that a larger number of local bands will be given the chance to perform via the BBC Introducing Stage in the Guildhall Cinema. Local bands who would like the chance to appear at the Underground Festival should submit their music to BBC Radio Gloucestershire via the BBC Introducing uploader, which can be found on the BBC Introducing web site (www.bbc.co.uk/music/introducing/uploader).

For more information, see the Underground Festival website.

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