Parade heralds start of three-week Brighton Festival

The festival will launch with a children's parade

A children's parade, "oozing" sculptures, and music are among the attractions of a three-week community festival which starts on Saturday.

Brighton Festival will also include performances from space rock band Spiritualized, Senegalese group Orchestra Baobab and events at the Brighton Dome, the Pavilion Gardens and the Theatre Royal.

The annual event, which runs to 26 May, promises 120 events, according to festival guest director Frank Cottrell-Boyce.

The award-winning children’s author and screenwriter said the city will share its "fun, gags, bright ideas and beauty with the rest of the world".

The festival was started in 1967, and featured performances by Laurence Olivier, Anthony Hopkins and Yehudi Menuhin.

Mr Cottrell-Boyce said he'd had "the time of his life" helping the 2024 festival crew find acts, shows, ideas and performers from the event.

He added: "Get ready to laugh, cry, dance, be bedazzled. A festival full of magic and hope.”

“This festival is a chance for Brighton to share its fun, gags, bright ideas and beauty with the rest of the world.

"To give us all a bit of that Brighton Bounce. To give us hope. So come and see, or better still come and get involved."

Author and screenwriter Frank Cottrell-Boyce is this year's guest festival director

An interactive installation will invite the public to weave and wind thousands of metres of string together in the Royal Pavilion Gardens, and eco building Earthship will host a locally sourced three-course dining experience.

Over the years the festival has seen appearances from Count Basie and Ella Fitzgerald and guest directors have included poet Lemn Sissay, and author Ali Smith and Aung San Suu Kyi.

Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival chief executive Andrew Comben announced in April he was leaving the role after 16 years.