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First Acts Announced!
We’ve announced the first acts for the festival! We’re kicking off with internationally acclaimed, genre-splicing supergroup LYR, fronted by none other than the poet laureate Simon Armitage, alongside local singer-songwriter Richard Walters and multi-instrumentalist/producer Patrick James Pearson.
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“We’re super excited to be welcoming LYR to Alton for the first time,” says AAF Chair Annie Lancaster. “This is something really new and different for the town and sets the standard for the rest of the festival.”
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In our literary programming stream, we are thrilled to make Patrice Lawrence the first big author announcement. Patrice writes across genres and age groups and has won multiple awards, including the Bookseller YA Prize and Waterstones Prize for Older Children's Fiction, the Little Rebels Book Award, the inaugural Jhalak Prize for Children and Young People, the Woman and Home Teen Drama Award, and the CrimeFest YA Prize twice. In 2023, she became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
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You can read more about LYR and Patrice Lawrence on our ‘Acts’ page.
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Fundraising quiz
Alton Arts Festival is holding a Fundraising Quiz in Alton’s Assembly Rooms on 27th October 2023. Tickets are £10 per person, which includes a glass of fizz and some nibbles. Teams of up to 8 people are welcome, but smaller teams can also be accommodated.
Questions will be on the theme of the arts, and the winning team will take away exclusive festival merchandise.
As well as the quiz, there will be a fancy raffle with the chance to win arts-themed prizes.
Quizzers are welcome to bring their own food to supplement the nibbles. A bar will be available, courtesy of Goldfinch Books.
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Tickets are available from We Got Tickets