For more than 40 years we have promoted arts and educational activities, integrating them into the community of Presteigne and the surrounding area of mid Wales and the borders.
Our exciting programme of events includes performances by well known musicians, inspiring talks, films, and workshops for children and adults. BECOME A FRIEND OF MID BORDER ARTS
Music Lessons is a book about the cathartic power of music. For award-winning author and composer Stephen Johnson, there have been moments when music has confronted him with life-changing insights.
Three leading poets – Samantha Wynne Rhydderch, Michèle Roberts and Mari Ellis Dunning – will read from their most recent work in what promises to be a lively and enjoyable event.
Dr Sioned Davies introduces us to Lady Charlotte Guest, one of the most formidable women of the 19th century.
In the Cut (2003) is a taut psychological thriller starring Meg Ryan, Mark Ruffalo, Jennifer Jason Leigh and Kevin Bacon. Adapted by Campion from Susanna Moore’s novel, the film focuses on an introvert New York English professor who becomes personally entangled with a detective investigating a series of gruesome murders in her Manhattan neighbourhood.
Classified 18 (suitable only for those aged 18 and over)
Composer, educator and Festival Vice-President Thomas Hyde leads an engaging panel discussion with composers Cheryl Frances-Hoad, Electra Perivolaris, Lynne Plowman, Claire Victoria Roberts and Mathilde Wantenaar. They talk about their new violin and piano works – musical responses to Prokofiev’s charming Five Melodies, originally imagined as soprano vocalises and later reworked for violin and piano by the composer himself.
The Piano (1993) is a historical romance starring Holly Hunter, Harvey Keitel and Sam Neill with Anna Paquin in her first major role. The film tells the story of a mute Scottish woman who travels with her young daughter to a remote part of New Zealand after an arranged marriage to a settler. While the story echoes Jane Mander’s 1920 novel The Story of a New Zealand River, Jane Campion has also cited Wuthering Heights and The African Queen among the film’s inspirations.
It features a memorable soundtrack by composer Michael Nyman.
Classified 15 (suitable for those aged 15 and over)
Bright Star (2009) is a biographical romantic drama, based on the last three years of the life of poet John Keats (Ben Whishaw) and his romantic relationship with Fanny Brawne (Abbie Cornish). Jane Campion’s screenplay was inspired by the 1997 biography of Keats by Andrew Motion, who served as a script consultant on the film.
Classified PG (suitable for any age, but parental guidance is advised).
Carwyn Graves’ book, Tir, has been called a ‘love letter to the Welsh countryside’ and is a unique exploration of the deep connections between Welsh culture, language and landscape.
2026 Festival composer-in-residence Michael Zev Gordon discusses his life, career and music with conductor, singer and composer George Parris.
The Velvet Violin returns with a relaxed, cabaret style evening with Whiskey Moon Face as well as Little Rumba, rather than just a picture of them on the website (sorry about that) and of course the legendary Velvet Violin Quiz.
Folk memory, legends, place names, the landscape around us -- all are whispered histories of our distant, deep past, not of our ancestors from one time alone but of all who have lived and left traces in history´s river, filling the time and space between their time and land and Radnorshire today. "Silver from distant Suns" is a programme of music and poetry that give voice to those ancient people -- today's folk legends -- and their times.
Described as “one of Wales’s leading composers” by Wales Arts Review, Claire Victoria Roberts is a vocalist, violinist and composer taking traditional Welsh song in a new direction.
In collaboration with virtuosic strings, she performs folk songs and traditional music from both Wales and Argentina (where, in Patagonia, there is a Welsh- speaking community.)
