The Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival is a music and arts festival, held on the Belladrum Estate in Kiltarlity near Inverness, in Scotland. It is normally held at the start of August. Founded in 2004, the festival has rapidly grown in popularity. The festival has sold out in advance every year since 2008. The capacity of the 2019 festival was 20,000.[1]
Background information
The festival is well known for its wide-ranging musical scope, as well as its family friendly atmosphere, with a large dedicated family camp-site, as well as free entry for children under the age of 12.
Previous acts that have played at the festival include Madness, Tom Jones, Two Door Cinema Club, Kaiser Chiefs, Ed Sheeran, Ben Howard, James, Manic Street Preachers, Deacon Blue, Texas Embrace, The Automatic, The Proclaimers, The Wombats, Travis, and many more.
Stages include, The Garden Stage (Main Stage set in Italian Gardens), The Hot House (Rock Indie, Alternative, Singer-songwriter), The Grassroots (folk, roots, acoustic), Venus Flytrap (comedy, wrestling, cabaret), The Seedlings (emerging and buzz new acts), Mother's Ruin (Dance and Electronic), The Verb Garden (talks, debates, films), The Burke and Hare (cabaret, performance, dj's), The Bella Bar stage, Free Range Folk Stage (singer-songwriters, traditional, acoustic based bands), Jazz Bar (new for 2016) and an array of busking stages.
Other areas of the festival include a dedicated children's area, with puppet workshops, arts and crafts, circus skills, dance and music classes and much more. The Walled Garden hosts a variety of alternative therapies, the Burke & Hare and Free Rage Folk stages, and re-enactment groups.
Over the years the festival has also hosted Ice-rinks, roller discos, Danny Maccaskills Drop & Roll, and a zip line.
The festival has a tradition of selecting a theme and organisers encourage revellers to don fancy dress on the Saturday. Previous themes have been:
2023 - Cartoons
2022 - Myths and Legends
2021 - [cancelled due to covid]
2020 - [cancelled due to covid]
2019 - Science Fiction
2018 - Bollywood
2017 - Summer of Love
2016 - Superstition
2015 - Superheroes
2014 - Wild Life
2013 - Carnival
2012 - Royalty
2011 - Space
2010 - Wonderland
Tartan heart fringe
Fringe
In previous years as well as the festival itself there was also a Festival fringe which centered around the 2 weeks surrounding the festival.
This finished in the early hours of Hootananny's on the Thursday prior to the festival.
The fringe's gigs had no entry-fee in some bars/pubs however others may charge, the fringe showcased a variety of Acts and Music Genres.
The Fringe set the mood in the run up to Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival on 8 and 9 August 2008, offering a musical trail around the Highlands for the intrepid music lover.
2004
The festival began in 2004 with 2,000 people attending for one day in Belladrum's Italian Gardens, the terraced arena that now acts as the Garden Stage. Since then, the capacity has grown 18,500 people over two and a half days (3 - 5 August 2017), with an additional headliner being added to the ceilidh warm up on the Thursday night in 2015.
Winners of the Hootananny's Battle of the Bands Competition
2005
In 2005 the festival was on Friday 12 and Saturday 13 August. This year it had five stages, ranging in size from the Grassroots Tent, which has a capacity of approximately 250 and is dedicated to small acoustic and folk acts, through to the Garden Stage, which is a natural amphitheatre that can hold several thousand people
In 2005, new features include the Seedlings Stage for new or unsigned artists and the Venus Flytrap Palais, a stage totally dedicated to the wonderful and sometimes, frankly, weird in music, theatre, cabaret and performance art.[3]
The Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival returned to Scotland[10] on 28 July 2022 with the festival featuring performances from The Magic Numbers,[11] Tide Lines,[12] Daytime TV, Emeli Sandé,[13] Admiral Fallow, Nile Rodgers & Chic,[14] Dreadzone, The Fratellis,[15] Siobhan Miller, Vistas, Peat & Diesel (replacing Sam Ryder at short notice), Shed Seven, Passenger and a DJ set from Gok Wan. Highlights from the festival were broadcast on BBC Scotland[16][17] and BBC Alba, with Fiona MacKenzie and Niall Iain MacDonald[18] presenting. Full sets from a number of acts were also available on the BBC iPlayer.[19]
