7:50am Sunday 31st March 2013
By Tarik Al Rasheed
PLANS for another colourful St George’s Day celebration in Malvern are well under way.
Last year Malvern Town Council organised a day of festivities in honour of England’s patron saint for the first time and members were so pleased when hundreds of people turned out in support that they declared it would become an annual celebration.
Now, true to their word, they are planning an afternoon of music and entertainment on Sunday, April 21.
The event will start at 1.15pm in Priory Park, Great Malvern, where members of the Chase Jazz Band will be performing in the bandstand.
Mayor Ian Hopwood will give an official welcome at 1.45pm, before a parade led by Malvern Boys' Brigade and featuring a town crier, a papier-mache dragon and even St George himself riding on horseback will make its way up through the Abbey Archway and down Church Street, into Malvern Priory.
A service will take place in the church at 2pm, featuring traditional dancing, reading and poems and a re-enactment of the story of St George and the dragon by students from Dyson Perrins CE Academy.
John Jordan, Malvern’s deputy mayor, said he was delighted the celebrations had become a firm fixture in Malvern’s calendar and that he hoped people would show the event their support.
Malvern’s St George’s Day celebrations owe much to late town councillor William Atkinson, who originally proposed that the council should do something to celebrate before his sudden death in July 2010, aged 63.
Coun Hopwood credited Coun Atkinson with the success of last year’s event.
© Copyright 2001-2013 Newsquest Media Group
http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk
http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/trade_directory/