Chapelfield Gardens in Norwich is getting renamed

A new temporary name for a city park, the launch of the Adnams main stage and a freerunning spectacular were just some of the things announced at the launch of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival 2020.

Whilst last year's festival kicked off with a death-defying tightrope walk over Norwich Market, this year the launch will take place across a whole Welcome Weekend, which includes already announced singer-songwriter John Grant at the Yarmouth Hippodrome on Friday night and the freerunners of La Fabrique Royale who will leap across city buildings in a daring outdoor spectacular on Saturday and Sunday evening.

The free, family-friendly Garden Party is also returning on the middle weekend, between May 16 and 17, and to celebrate Chapelfield Gardens being the hub of the N&N Festival, it will be temporarily renamed to Festival Gardens and there will once again be plenty of street food and pop-up bars.

Alongside the popular Adnams Spiegeltent, which will host shows including Norfolk-born singer Oscar Jerome and The Noisettes lead singer Shingai, new for 2020 is The Adnams Main Stage which will see the return of Australian circus company Gravity and Other Myths with their Out of Chaos show.

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Among the other highlights at the festival, which takes place in venues across the city and dotted around Norfolk, include Irish musician Camille O'Sullivan, philosopher and author A.C. Grayling and genre-defying show Hot Brown Honey, which smashes stereotypes in an explosion of colour, culture and controversy.

Mr Brine, who joined the Norfolk and Norwich Festival as artistic director in January 2018, said: "There is something for everyone, whether you have a young family and want to bring them to the Garden Party or you want a night out of burlesque.

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"Norwich is beautiful and the people are fantastic and open to everything, they are also very proud and pleased to be here so it means the festival is an important part of the culture.

"The festival feels at home in Chapelfield Gardens so we thought we'd call it what we would like it to be for the time of the festival and we hope people join us there."

Tickets go on general sale at 10am on Thursday, February 27 at nnfestival.org.uk, by phone on 01603 531800 or at the new box office at The Guildhall (open from 11am to 4pm Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays until May and daily afterwards) and £7.50 tickets are available for 18 to 25-year-olds.