NEW Forest Folk Festival is back for its fabulous fifth year at Plaitford, near Romsey with a fantastic line-up.

In addition to headlining popular folk bands Show of Hands, Feast of Fiddles and Fotheringay the festival will welcome the chart-topping Tony Christie.

Contemporary folk band Ranagri have teamed up with 'Amarillo' singer Christie to create some exciting new music so expect tracks from their new joint album ‘The Great Irish Songbook’ which celebrates traditional songs from a shared Irish heritage.

The decision was made last year to bring forward the date of the festival to the beginning of the festival season, to avoid clashing with other events in the area. The festival runs from Wednesday June 6 - Sunday July 10.

Nick Curtis, who organises the logistics of the festival says, “We are really excited to have such a great line-up and are already planning for next year’s bands to ensure we can offer our folk fans the best on the circuit.

“To have Tony Christie on stage this year too, is a real treat. Ranagri and Tony have recently released a new album giving the folk scene a completely new sound.”

Tony Christie said: “I have always liked the traditional Irish songs and the opportunity for me to perform with Ranagri at the New Forest Festival this year is great. We are playing just before Feast of Fiddles in the line-up and I personally can’t wait to see them in full swing.”

Nick’s brother Keith handles the publicity for the festival and added; “Each year we are attracting more and more people to the event, changing people’s perception of folk music by demonstrating how broad and varied the music is now and highlighting just how good the musicians are on the folk festival circuit.

“We have the capacity to grow bigger, however, we want to keep our unique family atmosphere, which we pride ourselves on. It really is a family run festival with an army of volunteers helping us to put on a great festival. Taking into account feedback and requests from our audience, we improve our offering year on year.”

The idyllic location of Powells Farm, has been home to the Curtis family for six generations, and is the perfect location for this ‘friendly folk festival’.

The unique stage, an open fronted rustic barn, was lovingly built and extended to accommodate larger outfits of musicians, after the first successful festival, back in 2012. The rest of the year it’s used as a barn!