Newtown Festival, old-school entertainment

What started as a small fundraising event 31 years ago has become one of Sydney’s most popular annual community festivals – the Newtown Festival is back for another year, and with an anticipated turnout of 90,000 attendees, shows no sign of losing its appeal.

The Newtown Centre was formed in 1976 by a group of concerned locals wanting to provide support and services to those disadvantaged in the community, said festival co-director Sue Andersen. ”Because they didn’t have any funding to be able to run the centre and run the programs for disadvantaged people, they started up a little tiny festival that was in one area of the park, and it had one tiny stage with a couple of different stalls,” she said.

Unexpectedly, the Festival was such a hit it became an annual event, attracting a bigger crowd every year.

To this day, Camperdown Memorial Rest Park hosts the fundraising event that has seen a large number of major acts perform just prior to making it big on the national level. “The bands that play at the Festival tend to be the up-and-coming [artists] just before the next level of step-up. We’ve had Sarah Blasko just before she got really big, we had The Herd just before they got really big, we had The Whitlams as well,” Ms Andersen said.

This year, Ghoul, Seekae, Deep Sea Arcade and The Crayon Fields are among the headliners performing across three stages. There will also be 260 market stalls and a Writers’ Tent, featuring appearances from Thomas Keneally, Reg Mombassa and Richard Glover.

“It’s not just the festival actually – the whole neighbourhood celebrates the Newtown Festival. You walk down the streets surrounding the park and almost every fourth house has got a party,” Ms Andersen said. “It’s a real day of celebration for Newtown and the essence of Newtown.”

The Festival will run from 10am to 6pm on Sunday, November 8, at Camperdown Memorial Rest Park.

by Ehssan Veiszadeh