Notting Hill Carnival and Glastonbury have teamed up together for a new collaboration in the Block9 area of the festival.
Block9, the legendary “late-night” area of Glastonbury are creating a ‘home base’ for the Notting Hill carnival crew in their Block9 East field. Carnival processions will tour the Festival site and feature acts including The Mangrove Steelband.
A statement about the collaboration added: “DJ’s from Carnival bands also join the troupe to play on the world’s first 100% green electric carnival float. Masqueraders and Moko Jumbie from several long standing British Mas bands will come together for the procession and the parade will end with cooldown sessions at the Block9 East home base.”
Matthew Phillip, CEO of Notting Hill Carnival, said: “This is a collaboration we have been working on for a while now and are delighted to finally be making it happen. The heritage and history of Notting Hill Carnival is hugely important to the British cultural landscape in many of the same ways as Glastonbury Festival is, and they hold many of the same beliefs and represent the country on a global scale.
“Block9’s vision to make this possible is incredible – they are famed for creating grand and unique experiences that I see are akin to many of the performers of Carnival in their scale and ambition. It’s going to be great.”
Emily Eavis said: “I’ve always loved Notting Hill Carnival, especially during my years living round the corner in West London, and there have been so many connections with Glastonbury over the years. It’s a dream to finally bring some of the very fine crew here to the festival and I’m sure they will bring so much creativity, energy and insanely good music with their electric carnival procession, workshops and sound system base at Block9.”
Stephen Gallagher, Block9 co-founder alongside Gideon Berger, added: “For many years, it has been our ambition to work with Notting Hill Carnival. This year, we are delighted to join with them to bring the cream of West London’s Caribbean culture to the heart of rural Somerset for the first time.”
Earlier today (May 27), Block9 announced their line-up at this year’s festival.
The packed line-up include names like Todd Edwards, Honey Dijon, Floorplan, Hercules And Love Affair, Overmono, Shygirl, Hot Chip, Floating Points, Sherelle and many more.