Windsor Festival: more details

Douglas Hurd was British Home Secretary during some interesting times.

His years at the Foreign Office coincided with the end of the Cold War, the first Iraq war and the violent collapse of the former Yugoslavia.

His appearance at the Guildhall, Windsor, on Thursday, March 18, will launch this year’s Windsor Festival Spring Weekend, which runs until Sunday, March 21.

The spring event is now a popular annual precursor to the main festival in September, which will be 40 years old in 2010. 

This year the weekend offers a mixture of musical, literary, family and community events scattered throughout the town.

Lord Hurd of Westwell, as he now is, will share his experiences serving in the Thatcher and Major governments.

On the same night in Cumberland Lodge in Windsor Great Park, a concert entitled In Silence, Creation will be given in memory of Dick and Sylvia Shaw. 

Former Windsor mayor Dick was the first honorary secretary of Windsor Festival and Sylvia the last surviving signatory of the festival’s founding document.

The programme will include the world premiere of a work written by their son Francis Shaw with words by Canon John White.

Other attractions during the weekend festival will include authors William Fiennes and Alison Weir hosting a literary lunch at the Sir Christopher Wren’s House Hotel in Thames Street.

Alison will talk about her book on Anne Boleyn, while William will talk about his, in which he chronicles growing up in Broughton Castle.

Some of the region’s best young musicians ranging from Berkshire Youth Choir to the County Percussion Ensemble will perform in St George’s Chapel.

While Windsor and Eton Choral Society will stage Carl Orff’s setting of 24 secular poems about the fickleness of life – Carmina Burana – at School Hall, Eton College. The choir of Trinity College, Cambridge will perform centuries of choral music in a concert at Eton College Chapel While the mass choirs of Churches Together will perform Stainer’s The Crucifixion at the Parish Church – with festival-goers invited to join in.

The full 2010 programme is available at www.windsorfestival.com