Glastonbury Festival Of Contemporary Performing Arts - Areas - Dance Village

East Dance Crowd

Welcome to the Dance Village, Glastonbury's official boogie wonderland. Nestling just behind the Pyramid stage, the Dance Village is the place to stomp your feet, shake your hips and put your hands in the air… though not necessarily all at the same time.  If you're looking for dance music, you've probably found it;  from disco to dubstep and from roots reggae to rude basslines the Dance Village caters for all tastes.

Click on the links on the side of the page to find out what the Dance Village has in store, or continue reading for a short history of Glastonbury's own party paradise. And be sure to Like our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/GlastonburyDanceVillage for extra news, photos and much more.

A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE DANCE VILLAGE
The story of Glastonbury's Dance Village starts well before it even existed. It probably starts with a single performance, one quoted widely as one of the greatest live performances of all time. It was a first-time Glastonbury appearance for two brothers that catapulted dance music into the frame of the festival organisers. Orbital's 1994 performance on the Other Stage was both sonically uplifting and visually stunning, as Phil and Paul Hartnoll bounced about the stage in their signature head-torch glasses, to a soundtrack steeped in ambient techno and rave.

In 1995 Glastonbury received its first dedicated rave-space. It was named, simply, the Dance Tent. That first year saw performances from Massive Attack, System 7 & Eat Static, and the following years saw the tent's capacity grow and grow to meet the demands of a flourishing UK dance music scene.

Ten years on and the Dance Tent just didn't quite cut it anymore. Dance was a more complex beast and about far more than just DJs and electronic music. 2005 saw venues such as The Midnight Cabaret and The Ghost Train combined with the latest groove gadgetry in the form of Silent Disco headphone parties as the Dance Tent expanded to eight different venues and evolved to become the Dance Village.

The Dance Village has since played host to performances nearing 1,000 different acts, including many of the world's most renowned and respected international DJs, live acts, VJs and performers. From A Guy Called Gerald to Zinc the Dance Village has ridden the sprawling wave of electronic music, backed with a distinctive spirit of fun and a passion for a good show.

Legendary performances like Fatboy Slim's surprise DJ set from a military tank have rubbed shoulders with festival firsts such as UK Grime acts taking East Dance by storm. And the 1920s decadence of the Pussy Parlure's spiegeltent has seen burlesque dancers hanging from the rafters as well as Annie Nightingale's many Radio One broadcasts heralding the opening of the festival.

Each year we switch things up and keep things fresh, chopping, changing and rearranging to make sure the Dance Village is the vibrant party that everyone's come to expect. Each year there's a different design, a different highlight and a different surprise that no one sees coming, usually not even us!

You can find plenty more information around here about what to expect in our boogie wonderland. Check out our videos. But there's only one true way to get to know the Dance Village: get here, get involved, get down.