If you like beautiful countryside, people, folk music, dance, song and camping, then you’ll love Folk Camps.
We’ve been organising folk activity weeks and weekends for 50 years. With a hall or a marquee in which to dance and make music, our volunteers organise workshops, day-time activities and entertainment each evening.
Every Folk Camp experience is different. The activities to take part in are provided by the holidaymakers and vary enormously. A week’s offerings could be anything from rapper sword, boules, acapella singing, walking tours, dance calling, crafting or chess! There is a daily music workshop for experienced and novice musicians where every one and all instruments are welcome. If you’re an accomplished musician already, you might play with other equally-talented folk for the evening dance. Of course, you don’t have to join in everything, it’s all a matter of choice and there’s plenty of opportunity to visit the nearby area as well.
Workshops are arranged according to the wishes of campers and the skills and abilities of those attending. We share our expertise and help others to enjoy the rich folk music heritage that makes Folk Camps such fun. If you’re already an experienced dancer, singer or musician we invite you to share your skills. You’ll learn something new whatever your ability.
It is an open, warm and safe environment where work and the usual day to day routines are set aside.
Dancing is an important feature of Folk Camps: we dance every evening to live music. It doesn’t matter if you’ve never danced before, there are lots of experienced campers who will point, or gently push you in the right direction and you’ll soon get the hang of it. Or you can just sit back and watch the others!
Where we holiday is different from year to year, giving our Folk Campers a choice of environment and format. We choose a variety of locations to provide different local area interest and accessibility from across the country. Our rural marquee camps run for four weeks every summer and our hall camps (centred around a village hall) run for two. We also offer several weekend formats to give you the opportunity to try out the Folk Camps experience before committing to a week. Weekend camps are self-catering, at week-long summer camps your meals are provided by different teams of campers who prepare food each day. We eat communally giving us the chance to catch up with old and new friends at mealtimes.
Campers bring their own tent, campervan or caravan, personal washing equipment, cutlery and crockery and – just in case of rain – a pair of wellies. All sites have flushing toilets and shower facilities.
At every camp there’s a leader to coordinate activities, a warden to deal with camp logistics and on catered camps a member of staff organises the cooks-of-the-day and ensures plentiful and good food. The camp musician runs the daily band workshop, organises music for the evening and ensures that there’s music for the workshops.
Folk Camps are intimate and welcoming; you’ll soon know everyone on site. Many families have been attending camps for years. Different generations mix easily at Folk Camps. Small children soon find playmates, teenagers form their own groups which means adults find they can relax knowing their family members are enjoying themselves in a safe environment. You’ll be amazed how quickly new campers find friends and acquire new skills.
Folk Camps is a registered not-for-profit charity, that preserves and promotes traditional music, song and dance. We run holidays throughout the year where you can participate, learn something new, share your skills, and have a great time.
Find out what people have said about their experiences of Folk Camps.
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