IT’S big, and it’s back – after an unavoidable trip down the east coast to Douglas for last year’s event, this weekend the Big Wheel Blues Festival will return to its spiritual home of Laxey village.
And two full days of 12-bar rhythms and soulful strumming are a fine way for the festival to mark its homecoming.
The refurbished Pavilion Ballroom in Laxey Glen Gardens is the venue for two evening concerts, two free-entry daytime stages featuring local performers, and a host of family activities in the gardens organised by the Isle of Man Children’s Centre, the charity to whom all money raised through the festival will be going.
Headliners Mud Morganfield, Kris Dollimore and Cherry Lee Mewis will play Saturday night, with bluesbreaker Buddy Whittington, Paddy Milner and Marcus Bonfanti performing on Sunday night. Doors will open at 7.30pm both nights, with sets due to finish by 11.45pm.
As for the daytime schedules, Saturday on the bowling green acoustic stage will feature, for 35-minute sets each, Hit and Run at 12.50pm, Mannin Black at 1.30pm, Beastie Dovey at 2.10pm, Al Lawrence at 2.50pm, Hugh Price at 3.30pm and John Barker closing the stage from 4.10pm.
Meanwhile, over in the Pavilion on the electric stage, the Richie Moore Band will get things under way at 1pm, followed by Bartoads at 1.45pm. Walter Ego will play at 2.30pm, before Manx Radio’s finest Stalking Heads play at 3.15pm and Loose Crew finish things off at 4.05pm.
Sunday’s daytime line-up on the acoustic stage will start with an as yet unconfirmed act at 12.50pm, then Blue John and Papa Cass will entertain at 1.30pm. Dickie Best and Tony Knowles will pair up at 2.10pm, ahead of Another Shade of Blue at 2.50pm. Richie Moore will get a second outing at the festival at 3.30pm, before a stage-closing set from the Manx Jazz Cats starting at 4.10pm.
The concurrent electric stage will also be opened with a band yet to be confirmed at 1pm. Condition Blue will play at 1.45pm, Borderline at 2.30pm, the Bus Pass Blues Band at 3.15pm, and then the Big Wheel Blues Band close the stage from 4.05pm.
Travel wise, in addition to the normal Saturday and Sunday bus timetables (which will run at extra capacity), extra evening buses from Laxey will run on Saturday at 7.10pm, 9.10pm, 10.29pm, 11.15pm and 12.28am to Douglas, and at 7.15pm, 8.15pm, 9.35pm, 11.15pm, 11.40pm and 12.40am to Ramsey.
On Sunday, extra buses will leave Laxey for Douglas at 7.14pm, 9.14pm, 11.15pm and midnight, and for Ramsey at 7.10pm, 9.10pm, 11.15pm, 11.30pm and midnight.
Also, on Sunday the more intensive timetable C – instead of timetable B – will be in operation on both the Manx Electric and Snaefell Mountain Railways.
Full details and tickets, which cost £20 per night, are available online at www.bigwheelblues.com and from Peter Norris Music in Finch Road, Douglas.
For further information, email committee@bigwheelblues.com