We had the idea of putting on a festival to celebrate local playwright Dennis Potter, and when I looked for funding on the Internet, I went to the Countryside Agency’s website because they have been very involved in this area, and that’s where I discovered the LHI scheme.

The process of applying for LHI was very easy compared to other grants - the application form was very nice and concise compared to some I’ve had to fill in in the past. It asked for all the relevant information but you didn’t have to duplicate yourself.

I did a draft application and Emailed that to the Regional Adviser, who commented on it and gave us some useful feedback about how our plans would fit into the LHI’s criteria. We already had quite a clear idea of what we wanted to do, and there wasn’t anything we had to change to make it fit into the LHI scheme.

Having a profile on the LHI’s website was very good, because it helped us to think about how we were going to promote the festival ourselves and what information we were going to gather. That set the LHI apart from all the other funders.

We also had a lot of support, which is another special aspect of LHI that you don’t get with other funders. Louis Purver came and visited us several times and talked through some of the details of the event with us. We knew he was there in case we needed to ask him anything. As well as being an LHI project support worker, Louis is a fan of Dennis Potter and had had experience of filming in the past, so he also came and contributed a film to the day.

The festival involved lots of volunteers, who were recruited partly through the radio and partly by word of mouth. They were stewards on the day, part of the management committee, and organised whole events, they erected the stage, exhibited their own arts and crafts work, and came and were trained in some of the recording techniques, making programmes about their events.

The LHI money paid for publicity, staging, displays, and marquees for workshops, and also facilitated performances by local writers and all the region’s brass bands. We had nearly every brass band in the Forest of Dean playing on the same stage on the same day, which was quite an achievement. That’s never been done before, and they wanted to come together to celebrate.

Some people who came were amazed at the range of different things that are going on in the Forest of Dean, and I think it’s given people a sense of pride in their community, and more understanding of the heritage, and encouraged everyone to value the unique local culture a lot more. Some of the people who trained in radio techniques as part of the festival are still working with the radio station, making programmes about what interests them in the history and culture of the area.

It was all recorded to be put on a website, which was running during the festival, so
we’ve got quite a lot of documentation of the event, not just digital photographs but also recordings of radio interviews. We’re now collating all the final pieces of evidence ready to send to the LHI, and then we may well put it as a separate Voices Festival page on the radio station’s website, where we already have a Dennis Potter website. We’ve gathered a lot of valuable information about Dennis Potter, and we’re hoping to create some sort of archive that will be of benefit to students.

I’d worked on a music festival before, but most of the management committee had not been involved in anything of this sort, so the organisation and how to go about it was very much a learning curve that we shared amongst each other. Now lots of people want to do another festival - not just people who helped organise this one, but people who came forward on the day, and following the event. And they want to widen the scope, so it’s not just a celebration of Dennis Potter but looking at other local writers.