Video: Preview of the Melodica Acoustic Festival
Melodica Acoustic Festival featuring acts from all around the world is coming to Nottingham for the first time this weekend.
The two-day event will see artists perform at Rough Trade Records tomorrow (Saturday August 13) and at Jamcafe on Sunday (August 14) from 12pm until 12am.
The festival started in Melbourne in 2007 and there are now regular festivals at some of the biggest cities in the world, including New York, Berlin and Paris.
One of the curators responsible for bringing the festival to Nottingham explained why the festival has come to the city.
It’s been a long time coming
Rob Maddison said: “The unwritten rule of the festival is that if you play some of the other ones, you’re meant to organise one.
“It’s great to organise one in you home town and it’s been a long time coming.
“We’ve got five local bands on as well so the nice thing is that all the international acts can meet the bands and that they can then play other Melodica festivals elsewhere.”
This is my first time here and is what I love about it
The founder of the festival Pete Uhlenbruch explained why the festival was created and why he loves coming to new cities.
He said: “This is my first time here and this is what I love about it; I get to visit new cities, new countries and new songwriters from all around the world.
“The whole point is to build community and encourage networking with artists.
“The networking happens on an international basis which is really exciting considering it started out just nine years ago.”
He told us about the festival and we said yes please
The owner of Jamcafe Bradley Rice cannot wait to be one of the first Nottingham hosts of the festival.
He said: “I know Rob [Maddison] and he’s been telling me about it for many years; it’s a rather exciting prospect for it to come to Jamcafe.
“He’s a regular customer, a friend of mine and has been performing regularly here at Jamcafe; he likes what we do and we like what he does, he told us about the festival and we said yes please.
“We’ve teamed up with Rough Trade as well and we do gig shares and that kind of thing so it felt natural to do it together.”
