The rooftops of King’s Walk multi-storey and Eastgate Centre carparks are to be transformed into a summer festival of theatre, music and performance that gets underway today.

The Inaugural Rooftop Festival is a brand-new event for Gloucester that will see a host of internationally recognised musicians and performers appear alongside some of Gloucestershire’s most talented musicians, poets and storytellers.

The event kicks-off this evening at 7:30pm with ‘Tales from the Rooftops’, a specially commissioned work performed by artists from The Roundhouse, the iconic London venue and charity renowned for transforming young lives through creativity. ‘Other Animals’ – who have been touring in Europe recently – have flown in and will be performing tracks from their latest album.

The Multi-Story Orchestra will be joining forces with children from local schools tomorrow as they perform one of the most highly anticipated concerts of the festival programme. The evening opens with Vivaldi’s famous La Follia performed with instrumentalists from Gloucestershire Academy of Music and a series of arias performed by Multi-Story soloists.

One performance sure to get the pulse racing will come on Sunday when the Family Circus Day gets underway inside the King’s Walk multi-story car park. Featuring spectacular acrobatics and dance-theatre choreographed around a wheel, the event looks one of the highlights of the entire festival.

Emma Bright, who co-ordinates the festival’s public relations, says the Rooftop Festival is a great event for the city, one that will help increase the profile of its growing arts scene. She said: “There’s so many events on to inspire the people of Gloucester, whether it’s performances, music or poetry recitals. We want to create a festival that appeals to young people and gives them opportunities to get involved in the arts.

“Many of the performers are used to being at big festivals so it’s great that we’ve been able to attract them to the inaugural Rooftop Festival. When we initially launched the festival, it was over an initial 2-year plan, we’re hopeful of extending that and looking to make it a regular event for the city for many years to come.”