Bill shares this latest news on behalf of All Wight Now, in his own words. Ed
Experience 1970, the three-day weekend celebration to honour the history-making Isle of Wight ‘Last Great Event’ festival, is now to be staged next year after organisers reluctantly accepted that Covid-19 restrictions made this September’s spectacular impossible to stage.
The Isle of Wight made history with its 1970 Festival, starring the incomparable Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, The Who, The Moody Blues and a clutch of other phenomenal artists.
Experience 1970 is designed to honour that event and was planned for 4th-6th September with an all-star bill led by the Moodies’ John Lodge.
2021 dates
Tickets already sold will be valid for the rescheduled festival which will now take place in 2021 over the 3rd-5th September weekend at the iconic 1970 site – East Afton Farm.
Chief organisers, Chris Hewitt and Andy Sharrocks, were determined to give the 2020 event every chance of going ahead.
They decided against an early postponement in the hope that social distancing and other restrictions prompted by Covid-19 would have receded sufficiently to allow Experience 1970 to go ahead this September.
Hewitt: Must ensure safety of everyone at event
Chris said,
“Sadly, although there has been progress in relaxing the restrictions, we have to accept we could not stage the event we had planned for this year.
“To ensure the safety of everyone at the event and, indeed, all our hosts on the Isle of Wight, we cannot take the risk of staging the event this year.
“But we have been in touch with all the artists and they are fully behind our decision to stage Experience 1970 in 2021. They all want to play next year. The 1970 festival is a massive landmark in rock music history and must be marked…and we will mark it next year in style.
“Our number one priority is health and safety and we feel this is the right decision. The Coronavirus outbreak has been fast moving from day to day and we wanted to wait in case circumstances allowed us to proceed. Now our aim is to use the extra time to create an even better anniversary event in 2021.
“All tickets already sold are valid for the 2021 dates and we are determined to stage one hell of a party with Experience 1970.”
Image: Marco Verch under CC BY 2.0
