It’s Back! Award-winning Chase Park Festival Returns This Summer

Press release

The organisers of the celebrated “festival for everyone” has confirmed that it will return once again this August.

Chase Park Festival, renowned as being an all family affair and an event that boasts first class access for disabled guests and artists, will return on Saturday, August 26th but festival goers take note, there’s a location change for this year’s event.

Now in its 8th year, Chase Park Festival will take place in the iconic Victorian setting of Saltwell Park. The Friends of Chase Park group are in the process of making some much-needed improvements to the site in Whickham and, as a result, Festival organiser Alistair McDonald has decided to host August’s gathering at one of Gateshead’s most iconic settings.

“It’s great that Chase Park Festival will return for another year and it feels amazing to be back,” explains Alistair.

“It isn’t easy to keep on bringing it back each year but we really think this one is going to be our biggest, most accessible and best yet.

“This will be the first time we have moved from our spiritual home of Chase Park in Whickham, due to the building works we couldn’t hold the festival in Chase Park.

“We are still Chase Park Festival but this time around we are Chase Park Festival @ Saltwell Park. We really hope that our audience will see this as a positive move.

“The access at Saltwell is great and there is a real heritage of great events such as Enchanted Parks which we hope will mean we will see a good crowd on the day of the festival. Saltwell Park really is an amazing place to hold a music festival.”

This year, the Chase Park Festival @ Saltwell Park team have hooked up with one of Newcastle’s leading live promoters, SSD Concerts, to deliver what they believe will be their strongest line-up yet.

In the past, the festival has seen the likes of Irish rock legends Ash and Sunderland’s The Futureheads take to the stage and music fans are in for a treat when its organisers confirm the line-up for 2017 next week.

Alistair McDonald adds: “I hope that fans of the event who have been coming for years will get behind the move and that we will see new faces from Gateshead coming along too. The transport links from Newcastle, Sunderland and Durham are fantastic so we really hope that we will have a good crowd in 2017.

We were over the moon to receive support from the Arts Council to help us bring the event back in 2017. The new location and the incredible line up we have combined should mean that Chase Park 2017 will be a real cracker!

“Gateshead Council has been really helpful in making the transition over to Saltwell Park. As ever we are very grateful to have the support from the Council.”

As in previous years, Chase Park Festival @ Saltwell Park boasts an illustrious list of partners – including Generator and the Percy Hedley Foundation – who will continue to support and make the festival a special one for all that attend.

Robert Ottaway, of the Able 2 team at the Percy Hedley Foundation, one of the festival’s long-standing supporters, will once again deliver an amazing support platform for this year’s disabled performers and attendees.

Speaking from Saltwell Park, he said:  “I love the new site.  It’s very easy to get to, the car park is very close, and importantly is very accessible for wheelchair users. What I really like is the opportunity for people to go to another area of the Park if they need to chill out, or relax away from the music, before coming back in when they are ready.

“I’m confident that this year will be the biggest and best yet, as we are all learning from the experiences of previous years and improving the event year on year, from the acts, facilities, promotion, and increasing the awareness of what the Festival is trying to achieve – create a Festival that is inclusive and accessible to everyone. The Percy Hedley Foundation have traditionally supplied a few acts for the second stage, and this year we will have four acts performing, more than we have done before!

“The Percy Hedley Foundation is delighted to continue its support for Chase Park @ Saltwell Park. Our service users in our Soundscapes studio are excited to be involved again, in developing their acts, ready to perform alongside their peers at an inclusive accessible event. It’s a wonderful opportunity for them to perform in front of thousands of music lovers.”