Two Fife festivals cancelled over coronavirus fears

The East Neuk Festival and the Crail Festival are the latest events to be cancelled because of the virus.

Organisers of the East Neuk Festival said the news would come as an “enormous disappointment” to many, but that it had been made because of the “seriousness of the developing crisis”.

A statement from the organisers said: “ENF owes so much to the musicians and expert team who make it happen every year. We are keenly aware that most of them are freelance, and that ENF is just one of many events being cancelled during this crisis, so they will be directly affected financially by this cancellation.

“We aim to ensure that nobody suffers as a result of the cancellation, but ENF cannot do this on its own. We will be offering all ticket holders a full refund, but ask that our audience might consider converting their ticket expenditure into a donation which we will use to honour contracts to artists and contractors.”

The ENF Retreat programme will be rescheduled later in the year and a small number of projects from 2020 will be postponed until next year’s event.

The Trustees and Crail Festival Society Committee announced last week their decision to cancel the 2020 Crail Festival.

This is the first cancellation in the 35 plus years of its existence.

The organisers said in a statement: “We expect that the Government’s current guidelines affecting our daily lives could remain in force beyond the festival period 15-25 July.

“At the moment these guidelines and associated advice are in force until the end of June; but even if they are immediately lifted thereafter we would be unable to complete the preparations we have had to put on hold.

“We are planning to re- book the artists we have had to cancel for 2021 as we were very pleased with this year’s line up.

“So far this is progressing well and Edwina Hayes, Hilary James and Simon Mayor, and Abba A Rival have already confirmed their participation.”

Next year’s Crail Festival will be held between July 14-24.