Family Affair - A Merseyside festival organiser has said he is "over the moon about getting not one but three" of reggae legend Bob Marley's sons to play. Liverpool International Music Festival's Yaw Owusu said it was a "real coup" to have Damien, Stephen and Julian Marley at the event. The brothers will appear at the Sefton Park event as part of the Ghetto Youths International Crew.The group, which includes Stephen's son Jo Mersa, will play on 25 August.
Face Value - The National Portrait Gallery in London is to host the first UK exhibition of portraits by Bob Dylan. A series of 12 pastel works, a mix of real and fictitious characters, will be displayed in the museum from September. The singer, 72, who has drawn and sketched since childhood, has only exhibited his art publicly for the past several years. Art historian John Elderfield, said the works were "products of the same extraordinary, inventive imagination". The images from Bob Dylan: Face Value have not been shown anywhere before.
Teesside Story - Organisers of a Teesside festival have described it as a "fantastic success". Stockton International Riverside Festival attracted crowds of visitors over the weekend and brought an estimated £1.3m into the local economy. The three-day event, now in its 26th year, featured musicians and performers and culminated in a parade of giant giraffes with a firework display. Early estimates for visitor numbers were that levels were similar to the 70,000 in 2012. Ken Dixon, Stockton Council's cabinet member for arts, leisure and culture, said, "The festival has become part of a wonderful calendar of events which brings the community together to celebrate alongside thousands of new visitors who come to see the performances. The weekend has been a fantastic success and shows off Stockton at its very best, putting the town on the world map of events."
On The Move? - Wales' leading cultural festival, the National Eisteddfod, should continue to change venue, say First Minister Carwyn Jones and Welsh Secretary David Jones. A taskforce is considering the event's future and looking at proposals such as holding it on the same site every year. But both politicians told BBC Radio Cymru they wanted the eisteddfod to continue being held in a different area of Wales. They were attending this year's event, in Denbigh, on Monday. The taskforce, chaired by broadcaster Roy Noble, is due to present its findings in the autumn to the Welsh government, which is providing £500,000 funding to the eisteddfod.
(Jim Evans)
