The Isle of Wight is home to more festivals than you can shake a stick at (there’s probably a festival dedicated to stick-shaking as well. For the nautical amongst you there is Cowes Week, or if you prefer walking there is the UK’s largest walking festival, or if you like garlic; you may be interested in the island’s Garlic festival. If you are not quite so well connected and more into dancing and trancing than yachting, you could always consider Bestival. But the granddaddy of them all has to be the legendary Isle of Wight Festival.
The festival began in field in Godshill, Isle of Wight, where in 1968 a group of hippies met for an event lasting for a day. The only major act to appear on a makeshift stage set between two trailers, was the US giants of rock Jefferson Airplane. Support was provided by rock newbies The Move with Roy Wood, and an anoymous outfit called T-Rex. Although a messy affair, this rock festival was the first of its kind to be held in the UK and set the bar for others to follow in the next decade. 2010’s Isle of Wight Festival runs from 10th to 13th June and is sure to keep up the recent good work, but it wasn’t always like that.
The [Isle of Wight Festival|IOW festival] became far more ambitious in 1969, expanding to two whole days and headlined by Bob Dylan, mainly because the prospect of performing on Tennyson’s home ground appealed to him– that and he saw a film of the island. Joe Cocker, The Who and Free were amongst acts that followed. After this reasonable level of success, the festival promoters planned a bigger and more professional line up for the 1970, including Jimi Hendrix (who lived for only one further month) Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, The Who, Leonard Cohen, The Moody Blues and Free. The five day festival and carnival was supposed to be the English answer to ‘Woodstock’, but sadly the love and peace ethos of the American original was not on show as almost one million hippies went on the rampage across the island forcing the authorities to clamp down on future festivals. In 1970 Parliament passed the ‘Isle of Wight Act’ which effectively banned all future festivals on the island.
After a 32 year absence it came back in 2002 with the Charlatans headlining supported by Robert Plant. Thousands of music fans took [Isle of Wight ferries|IOW ferries|a ferry to Isle of Wight|an Isle of Wight ferry|an IOW ferry] to enjoy the festival’s revival and this was just the start of things to come. Once hooked to the Island festival scene, it is only natural to return for Bestival which is traditionally and end-of-summer event.






