WITH over 150 acts about to descend on one beautiful venue – it can only mean one thing – the regions biggest music festival is about to begin. This weekend thousands of revellers will descend on Hitchin Priory for this year s Rhythms of the World.

WITH over 150 acts about to descend on one beautiful venue - it can only mean one thing - the regions' biggest music festival is about to begin.

This weekend thousands of revellers will descend on Hitchin Priory for this year's Rhythms of the World. And it promises to be the biggest yet as musicians from across the planet join local and UK talent for two days of music, art and celebration.

Steve Smither, band booker for the festival, said: "There are some incredibly exciting things happening - stuff people will have never seen before. We have Etran Finatawa from Niger, the Magnolia Sisters from Louisiana who have never been to England and Tatyana Lar, a singer who comes from a family of traditional reindeer herders, she doesn't speak a word of English and has an interpreter with her, so to get her to the festival is really exciting.

"Bleech are a band that are going to do incredibly well in the future. And on the main stage we have the Icelandic band Hjaltalin, who are coming over from playing in Denmark and Poland and by the time they play Latitude later in the year there will be a lot of talk about them.

"And you can't overlook the local performers. I'm really pleased that we can give them the opportunity to play. There's something really special that they can play in front of their mates.

"There are lots of things going on that you wouldn't imagine - I want people to go away and say 'Do you remember that band?'"

There will be a limited number of tickets on the gates, but the organisers recommend you buy them in advance. It costs �7 per adult per day and �3 for 6 to 17-year-olds. For a full list of where to get them go to www.rotw.org.uk