GUITING Music Festival celebrates 45 years of Summer music in the rural Cotswolds with ten days of concerts from Friday July 24 to Sunday August 2.

This year, thanks to the generosity of a local benefactor, organisers are able to offer £1,000 worth of free tickets to young music lovers to encourage their enthusiasm.

Joanna McGregor, the festival’s honorary president, opens the proceedings with her characteristically bold and exciting piano mix, from Satie through Stravinsky to Chopin and Piazzola.

Saturday night presents Purdy, a jazz singer with layers of pop, reminiscent of Nancy Sinatra, Nina Simone and Peggy Lee, topped off with a smattering of Sade. This exciting young talent has just appeared at the Cheltenham Jazz Festival.

This is followed on the Sunday with a lunchtime open-air jazz concert featuring Abi Flynn’s Jazz and Swing Allstars. The Brighton based band will be reminiscent of bands from the '50s and '60s, with some numbers from the swing era and some more modern sounds. It will be supported by The Funk Line Quartet with their lively blend of jazz-funk tunes.

Monday evening brings the wind quartet and piano of Ensemble 360 where they will play pieces by Reinecke, Beethoven, Glinka and Mozart. .

On Tuesday Christina McMaster and Lizzie Ball will show their fresh twist to piano and violin duos for an exciting and imaginative mix of 20th Century, primarily American, music. Look forward to Barber, Ravel, Gershwin, Monk, Ives, Cage, Debussy and others.

Parnassius Duo – Simon Callaghan and Hiroaki Takenouchi play on Wednesday night showcasing four hands piano compositions by Haydn, Schubert, Sterndale Bennett and Stravinsky. They delighted the audience at Guiting two years ago and are sure to do so again.

Thursday welcomes back Kathryn Tickell, this time with The Side. Kathryn is renowned for her superb mastery of the Northumbrian smallpipes and she has recently teamed up to form a hugely entertaining folk-classical ensemble, adding cello, harp, accordion and clog dancing.

Friday night is Jazz night with Andy Sheppard and his Bristol Quartet. Andy is a hugely talented and respected saxophonist and composer who has worked with a wide variety of jazz and classical musicians.

Natalie Klein and Havard Gimse play cello and piano for the last night of the evening concerts, with compositions by Debussy, Kurtag, Britten and Rachmaninov. Her cello is the ‘Simpson’ Guadagnini of 1777.

Sunday’s open-air folk concert starts with Hattie Briggs. Hers is an intriguing new talent that is exciting wide enthusiasm. Her influences are not strictly folk, James Taylor and Eva Cassidy having a considerable input to her style.

Johnny Coppin and Mike Silver display their natural ability to both write and perform to the fullest effect. They are versatile, talented and fluent in their delivery and this is sure to be a fine performance while The Roving Crows quintet rounds off this final concert.

For a chance to get free tickets go to the website www.guitingfestival.org