The LeeStock Music Festival (originally known as LeeFest) is an annual

music festival A music festival is a community event with performances of singing and instrument playing that is often presented with a theme such as musical genre (e.g., rock, blues, folk, jazz, classical music), nationality, locality of musicians, or h ...

, held in

Long Melford Long Melford, colloquially and historically also referred to as Melford, is a large village and civil parish in the Babergh District, Babergh district, in the county of Suffolk, England. It is on Suffolk's border with Essex, which is marked by ...

, Suffolk, since 2006 in memory of a local man, Lee Dunford, who died the same year. The festival raises money for the

Willow Foundation The Willow Foundation is a national charity established in 1999 by Arsenal footballer and BBC sports commentator Bob Wilson and his wife Megs as a lasting memorial to their daughter, Anna, who died of cancer aged 31. It is the only national charit ...

, a national charity that gives special days to seriously ill young adults. The festival is part of a number of events that aim to raise the profile of the Willow Foundation and raise money for them including a

pub crawl A pub crawl (sometimes called a bar tour, bar crawl or bar-hopping) is the act of visiting multiple pubs or bars in a single session. Background Many European cities have public pub crawls that serve as social gatherings for local expatriates an ...

, a football match, and a

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

cricket match. Prior to the 2012 festival, LeeStock has raised £25,000 for the Willow Foundation. In 2011, LeeStock was held over the weekend of 28 and 29 May and featured indie band

Dodgy Dodgy is an English rock band formed in Hounslow in 1990. The band rose to prominence during the Britpop era of the 1990s. They are best known for their hits "Staying Out for the Summer", "If You're Thinking of Me", and " Good Enough". Good ...

and ex-

The Bluetones The Bluetones are an English indie rock band, formed in Hounslow, Greater London, in 1993. The band's members are Mark Morriss on vocals, Adam Devlin on guitar, Mark's brother Scott Morriss on bass guitar, and Eds Chesters on drums. A fifth me ...

lead-singer

Mark Morriss Mark James Morriss (born 18 October 1971) is an English singer and songwriter, best known as the frontman for The Bluetones. He is the older brother of bandmate and bass player/illustrator Scott Morriss. He has released four solo albums, worked ...

as the headline acts along with acts from all over the UK. It was held at the White Horse public house in Sudbury. LeeStock 2012 was moved to the larger capacity home ground of

A.F.C. Sudbury Amalgamated Football Club Sudbury is a football club based in Sudbury, Suffolk, England. The club was formed in 1999 by the merger of Sudbury Town and Sudbury Wanderers, the process giving rise to the name Amalgamated Football Club Sudbury. ...

, King's Marsh, after selling out in 2011. It was headlined by Mark Morriss,

Nigel Clark Nigel Richard Clark (born 18 September 1966 in Redditch, Worcestershire, England) is an English singer-songwriter, best known as the lead singer and bassist of Dodgy. Life and career Clark returned to performing in 2005 as a solo artist. Th ...

of Dodgy, D:Ream and

Wheatus Wheatus are an American rock band from Northport, New York, formed in 1995. They are known principally for their 2000 single "Teenage Dirtbag", which appeared in the films '' Loser'' and ''Bully'', as well as the HBO miniseries ''Generation Kil ...

. The acoustic stage was headlined by

Nick Howard Nicholas 'Nick' Howard (born 24 April 1982, Brighton) is an English singer-songwriter who has released six albums since 2008 and played over 1000 shows across the world. His music has been featured on ''Pretty Little Liars, Switched at Birth ...

who went on to win that year's

The Voice of Germany ''The Voice of Germany'' is a German reality television, reality talent show created by John de Mol, based on the concept ''The Voice of Holland'' and its The Voice (franchise), international series. It began airing on ProSieben and Sat.1 on 24 ...

. In 2013 the festival moved again, to the stately home and

National Trust The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...

property

Melford Hall Melford Hall is a stately home in the village of Long Melford, Suffolk, England. Since 1786 it has been the seat of the Parker Baronets and is still lived in by the Hyde Parker family. Since 1960 it has been owned by the National Trust. The ha ...

, in

. The festival was headlined by

Toploader Toploader are an English rock band from Eastbourne, East Sussex, formed in 1997, with over two million album sales and several top 20 hits both home and abroad. Their debut album, ''Onka's Big Moka'', sold over one million units and peaked in ...

and

Space Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider ...

. By early 2014, the festival had raised almost £50,000 for the Willow Foundation and that year's event, held again at Melford Hall, was headlined by

the Lightning Seeds The Lightning Seeds (also known as Lightning Seeds) are an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1989 by Ian Broudie (vocals, guitar, producer), formerly of the bands Big in Japan, Care, and Original Mirrors. Originally a studio-based so ...

and an acoustic set by

Terrorvision ''TerrorVision'' is a 1986 American science fiction horror comedy film directed by Ted Nicolaou, produced and written by Albert and Charles Band and composed by Richard Band, all of whom would go on to found and work with Full Moon Features in 19 ...

. In late 2014, the headlining act for 2015 was announced as the pop rock band

Scouting for Girls Scouting for Girls are an English pop rock band. Their name is a play on the title of the 1908 Scouting handbook ''Scouting for Boys''. The band was formed in 2005 by three childhood friends from London, Roy Stride on piano and lead guitar/voc ...

. The event in May 2015 was the largest to date and on site camping again sold out over the weekend. The 2016 festival saw

The Feeling ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

headline with support from

The Hoosiers ''The'' () is a grammatical Article (grammar), article in English language, English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite ...

Lucy Spraggan Lucy Honour Ruby Spraggan (born 21 July 1991) is an English singer-songwriter. She auditioned for ''The X Factor (UK series 9), The X Factor'' in 2012, performing her own composition, "Last Night (Lucy Spraggan song), Last Night". On 3 November ...

and The New Town Kings. Tickets sold out in advance for Saturday entry with record numbers also in attendance on the Sunday. Organisers announced in the week after the event that the total now donated to the Willow Foundation in Memory of Lee Dunford now exceeded £100,000.00. Now a well established family friendly weekend music festival, the May 2017 edition, again at Melford Hall Park in Suffolk, will be the 10th 'birthday'. On 4 November, it was announced that 'Toploader' (www.leestock.org/toploader-to-return-to-melford-hall-in-2017) would be returning as a part of the 2017 lineup, with further announcements expected before the end of the year.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Official Website of the LeeStock Music Festival

Official Website of the Willow Foundation

White Horse, Sudbury
Music festivals in Suffolk Long Melford