Henley Festival was set up in 1982 as a charity, its mission being to stage a music and arts Festival for the local community. Nearly 40 years on, our core purpose remains the same and our aspiration is to support emerging talent across all genres of music and the art. Talent is everywhere but opportunities less so and to coincide with our 40th anniversary, we’re launching a new charitable initiative called RISE to support emerging talent in front and behind the spotlight. RISE will give talented individuals or groups, whatever their story, the opportunity to take the first steps into the exciting world of performance and creativity both public facing and back of house. We feel it’s our mission to nurture the next generation of creative talent, especially after the devastating effect of the pandemic on the cultural sector, so across our programme we’ll be providing opportunities for young musicians, comedians and visual artists to perform or show their work, as well as helping them before and after with marketing and production. Talent, of course isn’t just on the stage, it’s also the people ‘behind the scenes’ that bring the creative process together and we’re going to introduce a work experience programme for these disciplines including sound engineers, lighting designers, stage managers etc to give aspiring young people the chance to experience working in an industry that’s notoriously difficult to get into. Watch out for our RISE performers across the Festival week!
Alongside this we open Henley Festival's Family Sunday to families who use Camp Mohawk in Wargrave and Nomad in Henley and a range of other young people who otherwise would not be able to attend the Festival.
