"A full village wakes week combining four dressed wells, a scarecrow trail, a carnival parade, wakes royalty crowning, and a car boot sale in one of the Hope Valley's most community-spirited annual gatherings."

Hope Wakes and Well Dressing

"Jedburgh's week-long civic festival centres on the Callant who leads the mounted cavalcade on the Redeswire Ride commemorating a historic border skirmish, culminating in Festival Day with the Jedburgh Border Games."

Jedburgh Callants Festival

"A volunteer-run, free-entry community festival on Tenterden Recreation Ground blending live music, stalls, a dog show and family entertainment in the heart of the Weald."

Spirit of Tenterden Festival

"A no-budget, volunteer-run festival of innovative folk on three stages at Abbey Mill on the banks of the Wye, billed as the antithesis of and remedy for the X Factor."

Folk on the Lawn

"Celebrating its 40th year, this small friendly festival pairs a top folk line-up with real ale, morris displays and ceilidhs in the shadow of Ely's cathedral."

Ely Folk Festival

"A volunteer-run festival keeping South Cumbrian folk-arts, clog dance and storytelling alive, spilling out from the Hope and Anchor pub into the streets of Ulverston."

Furness Tradition

"A warm celebration of Northumbrian piping, fiddle and song spread across the village green, church and pubs of Rothbury, with ceilidhs and a free outdoor stage."

Rothbury Traditional Music Festival

"A 36th-year coastal festival that crowns the weekend with an Aqua Ceilidh in the open-air pool and a World Paper'n'Comb Championship alongside top trad acts."

Stonehaven Folk Festival

"A true island adventure to the white sands of the Hebridean isle nicknamed the Hawaii of the North, where Celtic music meets surf, sunshine and a tiny community."

Tiree Music Festival

"Kelso's civic week is anchored by the Kelso Laddie leading a mounted cavalcade to Yetholm and back, reviving the ancient custom of riding the burgh marches in the heart of the Tweed valley."

Kelso Civic Week and Kelso Laddies

"A week of traditional music and song under the Mourne Mountains by Carlingford Lough."

Fiddler's Green International Festival

"HebCelt brings world-class Celtic music, Gaelic culture and a touch of circus to the Outer Hebrides, set against the castle grounds and shores of the Isle of Lewis."

Hebridean Celtic Festival

"A Welsh-language music festival filling the squares of this stone-built Snowdonia town."

Sesiwn Fawr Dolgellau

"A country music festival set against the dramatic fells backdrop of Muncaster Castle in the Eskdale valley, featuring UK country acts across a weekend on one of Cumbria's most spectacular private estates."

Country By The Castle

"A not-for-profit greenfield arts festival founded in 1969, rooted in folk and world music under canvas in a Derbyshire hamlet, complete with a willow-circle opening ceremony."

Stainsby Festival

"A world-class international music festival fused with a summer music school since 1987, bringing young musicians from across the world to perform alongside established artists on the spectacular Cardigan Bay coastline."

Musicfest Aberystwyth

"Two dressed wells on Whitwell's village green are blessed in a procession from Jubilee Road, with the making open to visitors each evening the preceding week at the Scout and Guide HQ."

Whitwell Well Dressing

"Folk and roots music in the grounds of a Jacobean country house. The setting does most of the work; the line-up does the rest."

Folk by the Oak

"Founded in 1998 as a birthday party that got out of hand, Truck is a fiercely independent four-day music festival on a working farm that has championed new British indie and alternative talent for nearly three decades."

Truck Festival

"Traditional and contemporary folk fills the green fields around Warwick Castle, with morris sides, a festival choir and a fringe winding through the historic market town."

Warwick Folk Festival

"Three days of free music on the Kent seafront: shanties, folk songs, workshops, jamming sessions and market stalls rolling across a summer weekend by the North Sea."

Herne Bay Folk Festival

"A volunteer run village celebration of music, writers, street food and children's activities set against the Solva harbour coastline, with every penny going to good causes."

The Edge Festival

"Eyemouth's fishing-community festival crowns the Herring Queen each summer in a tradition rooted in a post-WWI Fisherman's Peace Picnic, celebrating the town's close ties to the sea."

Eyemouth Herring Queen Festival

"The original. Outdoor stages, Cherry Hinton Hall, world-class folk since 1965. The standard everything else is quietly measured against."

Cambridge Folk Festival

"Four days of roots, folk and rock music on a Hampshire farm near a medieval village, with headliners alongside comedy, theatre, storytelling and workshops in a festival that has won Best UK Festival for its relaxed, family-friendly atmosphere."

Wickham Festival

"A solar-powered green gathering in the woodlands of a West Norfolk estate, small enough that you know your campsite neighbours by Saturday night."

Harlequin Fayre

"A week of folk music, dance and song fills this Regency seaside town and its clifftop arena."

Sidmouth Folk Festival

"A century-old North Norfolk coastal carnival week packed with a raft race, sandcastle competitions, fancy dress, a fete, and a grand procession through town on Carnival Day."

Wells-next-the-Sea Carnival Week

"A well-loved Peak District village custom in the heart of the Hope Valley, where Bradwell's community gathers each August to display and bless its hand-crafted petal mosaics."

Bradwell Well Dressing

"Lauder's Common Riding is one of the most intimate of the Borders festivals, with a mounted Cornet leading riders along the ancient marches of this small market town on the edge of the Lammermuir Hills."

Lauder Common Riding

"A free and friendly folkie takeover of 13 atmospheric venues with Morris dancing, sing-arounds and an outdoor market stage across the old market town."

Melton Folk Festival

"Wales' largest cultural festival pitches its pink pavilion in a different corner of the country each year for a week of Welsh-language song, poetry and ceremony."

National Eisteddfod of Wales

"Marking 850 years since the first eisteddfod held at nearby Cardigan Castle in 1176, this touring Welsh-language cultural festival returns to North Pembrokeshire with 6,000 competitors across music, dance, literature, and visual arts on a maes open to all."

National Eisteddfod of Wales (Eisteddfod y Garreg Las)

"Ripon celebrates the return of St Wilfrid from Rome in 672 AD with a costumed procession through the city each August Bank Holiday Saturday, a piece of living medieval pageantry that has run continuously for well over a thousand years and remains entirely in the hands of the city's own community."

St Wilfrid Procession

"Coldstream's civic week climaxes with the Coldstreamer leading a mounted rideout to Flodden Field, honouring the Borderers who fell in the 1513 battle in one of the most moving riding ceremonies in Scotland."

Coldstream Civic Week

"For one Sunday the whole village of Leadenham fills with unpaid musicians, dancers and storytellers performing across indoor and outdoor stages purely as a labour of love."

Day of Lincolnshire Folk

"Nine days of ceilis, sheepdog trials, treasure hunts and the legendary Lurig Challenge Run in the Glens of Antrim, entirely community-run and ending with a full-street Irish dance finale."

Heart of the Glens Festival

"Eight days, 400 events, 20 venues across a Kentish coastal town. Concerts, ceilidhs, a parade and over 160 free events. The kind of week that makes a modest seaside town briefly essential."

Broadstairs Folk Week

"A man encased head to toe in sticky burrs walks the town for nine hours, a fertility custom of unknown but ancient origin."

Burryman's Parade

"The home of Dartmoor step dance and broom dance competitions, with ferret racing, two village pubs full of music and the late Bob Cann's broad Devon welcome."

Dartmoor Folk Festival

"A volunteer-run, not-for-profit gathering that scatters concerts, ceilidhs, puppetry and street performance through a historic Victorian seaside town on the cliffs."

Saltburn Folk Festival

"A free three-day community celebration that grew from a grassroots music idea into Suffolk's friendliest festival, with tribute acts, children's workshops, street food and a stage for all."

Saxmundham Community Fest

"Three stages in a Norfolk market-town meadow, run entirely by volunteers since 2008, with every surplus penny donated to local good causes."

Reepham Festival

"Fairport Convention host a vast folk-rock reunion in a field beside this Oxfordshire canal village each August."

Fairport's Cropredy Convention

"Run by a Yorkshire transatlantic folk band, this family-friendly weekend sets transatlantic roots music among the parkland and gardens of a stately home."

The Magpies Festival

"A small, inclusive festival that feels like a weekend-long party, with daily singarounds, sessions and workshops where everyone is invited to play a part."

White Horse Folk Festival

"Father Time crowns the elected Queen of the Revel in this North Cornwall village on the Monday after August 12th, after which she leads a mounted procession to the Revel Ground for Cornish wrestling, fancy dress, dancing and feasting in a celebration that has marked the founding of the village since the medieval period."

Marhamchurch Revel

"One of Scotland's oldest music festivals brings Gaelic nights, ceilidhs, pipe bands and distillery tours to a remote Kintyre town at the road's very end."

Mull of Kintyre Music Festival

"A 25,000-capacity festival on a Brecon Beacons estate where ten areas wrap live music around literature, science, comedy and a giant burning Green Man."

Green Man

"A working farm field below the silhouette of Corfe Castle. Five stages, four days, and the particular quiet of the Dorset hills when the music stops between sets."

Purbeck Valley Folk Festival

"The Levellers' fiercely independent family festival runs six stages with no sponsorship, a Magic Teapot, folk sessions and a different fancy-dress theme every Sunday."

Beautiful Days

"Three days of music, ale, art and family on a Suffolk estate, famed for its premieres and firsts and a reputation as one of the best-loved folk weekends in the country."

FolkEast

"A screen-free family festival of wild freedom and glittering wonder where woodland glades, campfires and circus turn a Cheshire estate into a storybook."

Just So Festival

"One of England's most singular calendar customs, this centuries-old West Witton rite sees a chanting crowd carry a glowing-eyed effigy of 'Bartle' through the village at nightfall before stabbing and burning him on the hillside above Wensleydale."

Burning Bartle

"The Victorian spa town of Llandrindod Wells dresses entirely in period costume for a week each August, with residents, traders and visitors all adopting Victorian dress for street entertainment, performances, markets and a grand parade through a town whose architecture still looks exactly as it did when the railway brought Victorian society to drink the waters."

Llandrindod Wells Victorian Festival

"One of Scotland's most distinctive gatherings, the Lonach sees kilted clansmen march twelve miles carrying pikes before the Highland Games begin at Bellabeg in the upper Don valley."

Lonach Highland and Friendly Society Gathering

"One of the highest-altitude well dressings in Derbyshire, Taddington's boards are dressed and displayed in a windswept limestone plateau village above the Wye Valley."

Taddington Well Dressing

"An effigy is carried through the Wensleydale village to a rhyme before being burned, origins long lost."

Burning of Old Bartle

"Over a hundred concerts plus rapper, clog and Morris teams spill through a clifftop fishing town for a full week of song, dance, shanties and storytelling."

Whitby Folk Week

"An award-winning micro-festival of indie-folk, science and nature set in coastal Candleston Woods, with intimate stages tucked between the trees by the sea."

Between the Trees

"A Bank Holiday town takeover with an open-air FAR Stage, Betjeman Sessions, pub music and street entertainment all within walking distance in Wadebridge."

Cornwall Folk Festival

"A historic East Yorkshire village spreads concerts across its Civic Hall, parish church and local pubs over the Bank Holiday weekend."

Cottingham Folk Festival

"Where exceptional arts, courageous activism and open-hearted belief meet in a stately home's parkland, holding its final festival at Boughton before moving home."

Greenbelt

"Five thousand people explore old cabins, dilapidated buildings and woodland in a forgotten Lincolnshire village over August Bank Holiday, soundtracked by international house, techno and electronica with fire-cooked banquets in the forest."

Lost Village Festival

"The UK's first employee-owned festival is a seriously silly, radically sustainable, meat-free adventure in utopia set in the grounds of a Northamptonshire hall."

Shambala Festival

"The folk family behind sixty years of Towersey start again on the Claydon Estate, the same dances and singarounds in a new Buckinghamshire field."

Found Festival

"Free live folk, shanty singing and ceilidh dancing tumble along the seafront of a Jurassic Coast town, anchored by headline concerts at the Marine Theatre."

Lyme Folk Weekend

"Four stages of folk, world music and Americana plus a dance tent, craft fair and children's festival fill the showground of a medieval Shropshire market town."

Shrewsbury Folk Festival

"A week of music, dance and song for adults of all abilities at England's national centre for folk arts, tucked into a manor in the Quantock Hills."

Halsway Folk Summer School

"A whole Suffolk market town turns its churches, pubs and castle bailey into stages for a long weekend of folk where most of the music is free and open to all."

Bungay Folk Festival

"Vintage biplanes drone overhead while hard driving bluegrass and old time pickers jam around a bonfire on one of the quirkiest festival fields in the country."

Didmarton Bluegrass Festival

"A friendly small scale singing festival in the Surrey countryside where everyone learns a cappella harmonies entirely by ear and ends the weekend performing them around a campfire."

SingFest

"Longnor's cobbled market square hosts one of the last well dressings of the season in the Staffordshire Moorlands, a rare continuation of the Derbyshire tradition just over the county border."

Longnor Well Dressing

"One of the latest and longest-running well dressings in the season, Hartington's boards grace the stone-clad village square near the duck pond, extending the ancient tradition well into autumn."

Hartington Well Dressing

"Three days of morris sides, ceilidh and song in a Herefordshire market town surrounded by hop yards and cider orchards."

Bromyard Folk Festival

"Sea shanty crews from across Britain take over five coastal venues, turning the harbour lanes of a tiny North Norfolk village into a roving maritime singalong all weekend."

Brancaster Staithe Sea Shanty Festival

"England's only festival of medieval music fills fourteenth century Bolton Castle and its church with lute, oud and bagpipe as performers explore the forgotten margins of the medieval world."

Medieval Music in the Dales

"The biggest dance festival in the UK brings over two hundred Morris and dance performances and fifty plus bands to fill a Dorset seaside town with colour and music."

Swanage Folk Festival

"Four days of traditional music on an Hebridean island reachable only by ferry, workshops, open sessions, ceilidhs in the island hall, and the Atlantic on all four sides."

Ceol Cholasa: Colonsay Folk Festival

"Three days in a Black Isle village near Inverness where the sessions run late and the Moray Firth catches the September light outside, a small Highland folk festival doing exactly what it promised."

Ardersier Folk Festival

"A 35 year old festival that scatters concerts and slow sessions for beginners between a parish church, the common and snug pub back rooms in a Wharfedale market town."

Otley Folk Festival

"A small but perfectly formed music festival with a heart of folk spread across barns and an orchard on a working farm on the wild North Norfolk coast."

Deepdale Festival

"A volunteer run weekend of folk in a North Pennine village that climaxes with the marketplace burning of a wooden sculpture of the legendary Allendale Wolf."

Allen Valleys Folk Festival

"On a remote Hebridean island of more deer than people, a village hall and marquee fill with trad sessions, ceilidhs, step dancing and a samba procession."

Jura Music Festival

"On the first of October in this small Hertfordshire village, the leaves from Church Lane are swept onto the road so that an elderly man from the parish can roll down the lane and the children can shout after him, a custom so old and so eccentric that even the villagers are not entirely sure what it commemorates."

Braughing Old Man's Day

"A relaxed charity festival run for a historic village institute near Bolton where every artist gives their time free so all the proceeds support the Barlow."

Edgworth Folk Festival

"A brand new not for profit festival on a historic coastal peninsula mixing folk concerts, Morris dancing and a 1940s themed day at a Victorian gun battery museum."

Headland Folkfest

"Competitors from across the world converge on the Cairngorm village of Carrbridge to contest the Golden Spurtle trophy each October, cooking traditional porridge and open specialty oat dishes to a panel of judges in the village hall while the birch woods outside are turning the first rust of autumn."

World Porridge Making Championship

"Said to be the most prestigious traditional accordion and fiddle event in Scotland, it builds to a world famous Grand Dance with six hours of live music from eleven dance bands."

Shetland Accordion and Fiddle Festival

"The whole of the old seaport town rings with hearty singing as shanty crews from around the world fill pubs, boats and historic buildings with songs of the sea."

Harwich International Shanty Festival

"The Monday after October 10th brings a centuries-old charter fair to the streets of Sherborne, where by tradition hurdy-gurdy music plays all day and the fair is proclaimed from the town hall steps, a noisy autumn custom that has been held in this abbey town since the thirteenth century."

Sherborne Pack Monday Fair

"A not for profit autumn gathering in a Galloway market town that champions young traditional musicians with concerts, sessions and dancing at a converted bank turned arts centre."

Autumn Trad Festival

"The brainchild of Blazin Fiddles immerses a Highland village in fiddle music for a week of classes, talks, sessions and ceilidhs marking its 25th birthday."

Blazin in Beauly

"One of England's oldest surviving calendar customs, Punkie Night sees Hinton St George children parade through the village at dusk swinging handmade lanterns carved from mangelwurzels, accompanied by Morris dancing and the traditional Punkie Song."

Hinton St George Punkie Night

"Part festival and part ritual on the eve of Samhain, this celebration of Cornish folklore brings hobby horses, Mari Lwyds, ancestor rites and Morris dancers to a magical Arthurian village."

The Dark Gathering

"The estate village of Downham, preserved virtually unchanged since the 1950s with no TV aerials or modern signage, hosts its cherished annual bonfire and fireworks display on the village hall field on Guy Fawkes Night."

Downham Village Hall Bonfire and Fireworks

"The Llys Y Fran Young Farmers Club hosts a fireworks display beside the reservoir in a rural Pembrokeshire valley completely free of light pollution, making for an unusually vivid and atmospheric bonfire night sky."

Llys Y Fran Fireworks Display

"Set in the antiques-village backdrop of Battlesbridge, this community bonfire night includes a Guy Fawkes-making workshop, giant bonfire lighting ceremony, and a professional fireworks display with free sparklers on entry."

Battlesbridge Annual Firework Spectacular

"Sawston Parish Council's annual community bonfire and fireworks display at Huckeridge Hill raises funds for local charities through a volunteer bucket collection, keeping this Cambridgeshire village tradition alive each autumn."

Sawston Village Bonfire and Fireworks

"Organised by the community group The Olney Group, this annual display by an award-winning pyrotechnics company draws the whole market town together on the Sunday nearest bonfire night, with funfair rides and food stalls."

Olney Town Fireworks

"Four free days of folk, bluegrass, americana and indie spread across the bars, coffee shops and hotels of two North Coast towns, now in its 16th year as Northern Ireland's most beloved winter music weekend."

Atlantic Sessions

"Llandeilo's free three-day pre-Christmas festival fills the independent shops, cafes and streets of this Carmarthenshire market town with food, crafts, live music and a festive lights switch-on every third weekend of November."

Llandeilo Festival of Senses (Llandeilo Christmas Weekend)

"A brass band leads a candlelit procession down Clovelly's famously cobbled, car-free street to the harbour, where carols, Christmas grog, and fireworks over Bideford Bay raise funds for the village RNLI."

Clovelly RNLI Christmas Lights Switch On

"Since 1963 this tiny Cornish fishing village has draped its harbour walls, boats and buildings in around 7,000 hand-maintained bulbs each December, dimming them every 19th of December to honour the victims of the 1981 Penlee lifeboat disaster."

Mousehole Harbour Lights

"A free Christmas Folk Trail strings live acoustic music through the pubs and tea rooms of a Leicestershire market town across a full December weekend."

Melton Winter Festival

"Around 3,000 rubber ducks are released down the River Coln at 11am on Boxing Day, a tradition now in its late 30s year that raises funds for Bibury Cricket Club and draws crowds from across the Cotswolds."

Bibury Boxing Day Duck Race

"Clog-wearing longsword dancers ritually behead their captain with a lock of interwoven blades outside the village pub at eleven sharp."

Grenoside Sword Dance

"Eight dancers in military uniform weave metre-long steel swords into a single interlocked star in an unbroken display going back over 130 years."

Handsworth Sword Dancers Boxing Day

"One of the largest Hogmanay bonfires in Scotland, lit in the heart of this Borders town every New Year's Eve."

Biggar Bonfire

"At the stroke of midnight on Hogmanay, selected villagers carry ten-foot birch poles topped with burning tarred rags through the streets of Comrie, led by the pipe band, before hurling the spent flambeaux into the River Earn in a custom believed to date to pagan or Pictish times."

Comrie Flambeaux Procession

"At Hogmanay locals swing flaming wire cages of fire over their heads down the High Street to burn away the old year."

Stonehaven Fireball Ceremony

"Shetland's oldest fire festival opens the islands' Viking season each January with 200 to 300 torch-bearing guizers escorting a burning longship galley through the streets of Shetland's former capital to the harbour at Port Arthur."

Scalloway Fire Festival

"Sustainable Clevedon brings the community together each January at the town's Community Orchard to bang pots, sing to the apple trees, and share mulled cider in a centuries-old wassailing ceremony."

Clevedon Wassail

"A burning barrel of tar is carried around this Moray fishing village to mark the old new year, a Pictish-era survival."

Burning of the Clavie

"Hosted by Widders Border Morris on the ancient border between England and Wales, this January gathering weaves together West Country apple wassailing, the Welsh Mari Lwyd hobby-horse tradition, Morris dancing, mumming, and a ceilidh into a single boisterous riverside procession through Chepstow town centre."

Chepstow Wassail and Mari Lwyd

"One of England's oldest longsword teams parades from the Reading Room and dances across the moorland village in pink and blue Crimean-striped tunics."

Goathland Plough Stots Day of Dance

"Founded in 1961 by a group of friends reluctant to end their New Year celebrations, this community fire festival lights up Shetland's east Mainland each February with a torchlit galley procession and squads of guizers in hand-crafted Viking costumes."

Nesting and Girlsta Up Helly Aa

"Britain's first snowdrop town hosts nine days of guided snowdrop walks, open gardens, plant sales and a twilight lantern parade led by the mythical Galanthus Dragon through the streets of this ancient hilltop town."

Shaftesbury Snowdrop Festival

"Shetland's second-oldest fire festival, held since 1911 on Britain's most northerly island, draws over 200 guizers through the dark February night before a Viking galley is set ablaze on the shore at Uyeasound."

Uyeasound Up Helly Aa

"Annual celebration of Wales's patron saint held in Britain's smallest city, combining a Cross Square market, community parade, cathedral concert and the Ras Dewi Sant road race."

St David's Day Festival

"Local children race round the parish church swinging paper balls on string to chase away winter."

Whuppity Scoorie

"Black-faced clog dancers with wooden discs dance the length of this Pennine town every Easter Saturday."

Britannia Coco-nut Dancers

"One of England's oldest surviving charitable customs, this Easter Monday distribution of bread, cheese, and twin-stamped biscuits from the Old Workhouse on Sissinghurst Road commemorates the legendary 12th-century conjoined Chulkhurst twins who bequeathed their land to the village poor."

Biddenden Dole

"One of England's most spectacular May Day folk revivals, this four-day festival sees a giant leaf-covered Jack lead a thundering procession of Morris sides, giants and drummers through Hastings Old Town before being slain on West Hill to release the spirit of summer."

Hastings Jack in the Green

"A family May Day weekend at a Tudor castle with maypole dancing demonstrations and participation, an interactive Green Man play on the castle forecourt, and a traditional tug of war."

Hever Castle May Day Weekend

"One of England's oldest surviving May Day pageants, dating from 1864, where the streets of Knutsford are decorated with coloured sand mottoes before a costumed procession crowns the May Queen on the Heath."

Knutsford Royal May Day

"A traditional Dartmoor village May Day on the medieval village green, with maypole dancing, crowning of the May Queen, Grimspound Border Morris dancers, and classic fairground games."

Lustleigh May Day

"A boat-shaped horse decked in ribbons tours the town and harbour from May eve, accompanied by drums."

Minehead Hobby Horse

"One of Britain's oldest and most exuberant calendar customs, in which two rival hobby horses and their retinues dance through Padstow's harbour streets from midnight to midnight on May Day, drawing tens of thousands of spectators and Cornish exiles home from across the world."

Padstow Obby Oss

"One of Britain's oldest surviving folk customs, two rival hobby horses dance through Padstow's harbour streets all day to the hypnotic beat of drums and the traditional May Song, drawing tens of thousands of visitors."

Padstow Obby Oss (May Day)

"One of England's oldest continuous May Day traditions, traced to 1561, featuring a half-mile procession from Northill, a decorated hoop competition, Morris dancing, and the crowning of a May Queen on Ickwell Green."

Ickwell May Day

"A penance ritual dating to 1159, the Penny Hedge sees a woven hazel and willow hedge planted in Whitby's Upper Harbour at 9am on Ascension Eve, built to survive three tides, with a hornblower crying 'Out on ye!' to close the ceremony."

Whitby Penny Hedge

"A not-for-profit community festival now in its fifth decade, it fills almost every pub, hall and cobbled street in Holmfirth with concerts, singarounds, ceilidhs, morris dancing and family workshops across a single weekend each May."

Holmfirth Festival of Folk

"Couples in top hats and gowns dance the Furry Dance in and out of houses to welcome spring to this Cornish town."

Helston Flora Day

"Revived from medieval origins in 1972, the Randwick Wap sees a Wap Queen and Mayor carried through the village in costume before Double Gloucester cheeses are rolled downhill and the Mayor is ceremonially dunked in the pond."

Randwick Wap

"One of England's oldest surviving fishing-village customs, children carry flower-covered garlands through Abbotsbury on Old May Day (13 May) to collect for charity, continuing a tradition first recorded in 1867."

Abbotsbury Garland Day

"Five days of roots and folk music in the Welsh hills, where the campfire matters as much as the stage and the stars are genuinely good."

Fire in the Mountain

"A King clad entirely in flowers rides through the Peak District village before his garland is hoisted up the church tower."

Castleton Garland Day

"One of Staffordshire's oldest continuous well-dressing traditions, begun in 1843 as an act of thanksgiving after Endon's spring uniquely survived a devastating regional drought, the festival pairs intricately flower-petalled well panels with a May Queen crowning, maypole dancing, and the competitive sheaf-tossing contest."

Endon Well Dressing

"A centuries-old Oak Apple Day custom in which the Garland King rides horseback through the village encased to the shoulders in a vast bell-shaped floral frame, before the crowning bouquet is hoisted to the top of the church tower."

Garland King Day

"One of Britain's last surviving tree-dressing customs, the village black poplar has its flags ceremonially renewed each May in a tradition unbroken since 1786 and rooted in Oak Apple Day."

Arbor Day

"One of England's oldest unbroken Morris traditions, three Bampton sides dance through the streets from early morning until dusk on Spring Bank Holiday Monday, accompanied by fiddle and pipe and tabor."

Bampton Morris Dancing

"A masked hobby horse and grenadiers hunt a costumed Earl through the village before casting him into the sea."

Hunting of the Earl of Rone

"Wellow is Nottinghamshire's only permanent maypole village, and each Late Spring Bank Holiday Monday its 17-metre painted maypole becomes the centrepiece for the crowning of a May Queen chosen by secret village ballot, maypole dancing with red, white and blue ribbons, and a free open-air celebration on the village green."

Wellow Maypole Celebrations

"A multi-generational village green celebration centred on a 17-metre permanent maypole, with crowning of the May Queen, children's ribbon dances practiced over two months, swing boats, and stalls."

Wellow Maypole Day

"Three nights of pub sessions, waulking-song workshops and village-hall concerts mark the 30th year of folk on this island off the Ayrshire coast."

Arran Folk Festival

"Americana, bluegrass and punk-folk ring out from a medieval hilltop church while the audience sips real ale or Pimms beneath a midsummer evening view."

EdleFest

"Singarounds, seaside shanties and storytelling fill this fishing village's Salmon Bothy for the 16th gathering of song, tune and tradition."

HAAL Festival

"A long-running city folk weekend that fills the pubs with song, and by Saturday evening spills, quietly, into the streets."

St Albans Folk Festival

"An evening of concerts at the United Reformed Church is followed by a day of morris and clog dance winding through this riverside market town."

St Neots Folk Festival

"Folk and world music drift across the meadows of Radford Mill Farm with campfire sessions, gospel singing and tai chi between the stages."

Tangled Roots Festival

"One of Scotland's oldest village festivals, dating to 1704, Lilias Day fills Kilbarchan's streets with a costumed historic parade of over 300 years of local characters, pipe bands, and floral arches before spilling into the public park for a ceilidh tent, medieval village, and tug of war."

Kilbarchan Lilias Day

"A folk festival in a Norfolk field. The name is the description. Exactly what it sounds like, which is exactly what you want."

Folk in a Field

"The largest free nautical music festival in Europe. The whole harbour town sings, in pubs and on quaysides, all weekend long."

Falmouth Sea Shanty Festival

"Folk music at a ruined 13th-century castle on the Gower peninsula, with the estuary below and the sky doing something remarkable above."

Gower Folk Festival

"Three days of Scottish traditional music, song, dance and verse with bothy ballads, ceilidhs and competitions fill this north-east town for its 51st year."

Keith TMSA Festival

"A small Highland village fills with musicians every June. The mountains are the backdrop and the sessions go late."

Killin Music Fest

"A flotilla of heritage boats drops anchor in the seventeenth-century harbour for a weekend of music, dance, Scottish food and age-old craft demonstrations."

Scottish Traditional Boat Festival

"Bells, clogs and fiddles bring this historic market town alive as dance teams parade through the streets in a kaleidoscope of movement and sound."

Wimborne Minster Folk Festival

"One of the Scottish Borders' best-loved civic weeks, the Melrose Festival culminates in a horseback rideout through the shadow of the Eildon Hills and the crowning and installation of the Festival Queen on the Thursday."

Melrose Festival

"Contemporary and traditional music plays out across the wooded Hopton Court estate alongside a woodland spa, storytelling and four nights under canvas."

Beardy Folk Festival

"Over fifty acts play pubs, churches and the open street across this market town's ancient cobbled lanes for a weekend of acoustic music and morris."

Beverley Folk Festival

"A whole weekend of English and American folk dancing from Playford to the present, with national callers and bands across three halls, marking its 50th year."

Lichfield Folk Festival

"A small, reasonably priced village festival celebrating its 20th year with singarounds, workshops and ballad sessions in the Somerset countryside."

West Somerset Folk Festival

"Dumfries's ancient riding of the marches custom sees hundreds of horses gather at dawn to ride the burgh boundaries before the crowning of the Queen of the South and an afternoon parade of floats through the town."

Dumfries Guid Nychburris Day

"A tiny non-profit folk and indie gathering in a private Derbyshire garden north of Matlock celebrates its 20th anniversary with free-roaming family fun."

Exile Music Festival

"Scottish fiddle supergroup Blazin' Fiddles welcomes fiddlers, guitarists and pianists to venues across this Lanarkshire town for a weekend of classes, sessions and craic."

Blazin in Biggar

"A full day of folk sessions, open stages and real ale in the walled gardens of Nowton Park, where the 12th festival gathers East Anglia's finest acoustic talent."

Bury Folk Festival

"A dawn cavalcade to the Raid Stone commemorates a 1337 victory over English raiders, with Soor Plums handed between sweethearts and a Mixing of the Roses ceremony recalling the marriage of Margaret Tudor to James IV."

Galashiels Braw Lads Gathering

"One of Derbyshire's most traditional wakes weeks, with the crowning of the Wakes Carnival Queen at the historic Market House, a wakes service, orienteering, and a timed hill climb on East Bank."

Winster Wakes

"A small family-run folk festival on the family's own farm at the edge of the New Forest, drawing big names like Skerryvore and Fisherman's Friends to a famously friendly field."

New Forest Folk Festival

"A brilliantly curated lakeside roots gathering that punches far above its size, with three covered stages and a famously warm welcome in the Nottinghamshire fields."

Gate to Southwell Festival

"Northern Ireland's longest-running independent outdoor music and arts festival on a Causeway Coast farm, where eight stages in woodland and meadow give equal billing to grassroots acts and headline names at Chapter 16."

Stendhal Festival

"An intimate acoustic and folk weekend tucked away at Rose Farm in the quiet East Yorkshire countryside, beloved for its homespun, end-of-the-lane charm."

Moonbeams Festival

"Two days of live tribute bands and a food village set in the heart of the Durham Dales at Stanhope showground, with a popular fancy dress competition on the Saturday."

Stanhope Weekender Music Festival

"The UK's first and finest Americana festival, staged among the barns and animal pens of Easton Farm Park with Cajun roosters, hula dancing and murder ballads."

The Maverick Festival

"Every first Saturday of July, Ambleside children carry rush-and-flower bearings in procession to St Mary's Church, collecting gingerbread after the service in a Lakeland custom that stretches back to the days of earth-floor churches."

Ambleside Rushbearing

"Annan's traditional boundary-riding custom sees a mounted procession ride the ancient marches of this Solway coast burgh, upholding one of Dumfriesshire's oldest civic ceremonies."

Annan Riding of the Marches

"A boutique one-day festival that turns a Hertfordshire village green, church and memorial hall into stages, hailed by the BBC Radio 2 Folk Show as one of the best little festivals in the country."

Kimpton Folk Festival

"Since 1993, dozens of Morris sides have descended on this seaside town each July to fill its streets with the stomp and jingle of one of England's finest folk dancing gatherings."

Sheringham Potty Festival

"Winster is one of a handful of English villages with its own unbroken Morris tradition, and on Wakes Saturday the Winster Morris Men perform their distinctive stepping dances through the village street and at the old market house, a living transmission of a tradition that has never left this limestone Peak District village."

Winster Wakes Morris Dancing