Music festivals can be great fun. Anyone who has been to the likes of Leeds, Reading or Glastonbury will know that getting to see a wealth of different live bands across a few days, alongside all of the other things that can be enjoyed at a festival, is an excellent way to spend some time.
The problem can be that they aren’t necessarily brilliant for families because of the kinds of people that head along to festivals. When it comes to GuilFest at Stoke Park in Guilford, though, it has been named the Best Family Festival in the UK.
Two Days of Music
The joy of GuilFest is that it isn’t centred around just one day of music or even one band. Instead, it sees two days of music taking place plus other bits of ‘mayhem’ that you can get involved in over the Saturday and the Sunday. Although some of the bands might be cover artists, many of them are the real deal and are there to delight and amuse with songs that you will know.
Here is the line-up for Guilfest 2026:
Saturday 4th July 2026
- Sophie Ellis-Bextor
- Rudimental (DJ set)
- Lottery Winners
- ABC
- Dutty Moonshine Big Band
- Tiffany
- Echobelly
- Elvana
- Uncle Funks Disco Inferno
- Phats & Small
- Rick Parfitt Jnr
- Daft Funk Live
- Tankus
- Bob Marley Revival
- Rock Choir
Sunday 5th July 2026
- The Proclaimers
- Kula Shaker
- Kid Creole and the Coconuts
- Haircut 100
- Heather Small
- T’pau
- The Bootleg Beatles
- Bad Manners
- Hugh Cornwell
- The South
- The Smyths
- Letz Zep
- The Dolly Show
What Else You Can Get Up To
With any music festival, the music is obviously the key part of it. Yet away from the stages where you can watch music there are other things that you can do with your time. You can, for example, head along to the Comedy Tent to see some stand-up comedians give you a good laugh. There is a huge Beer Tent on-site for those of you that like to have a couple of drinks over the weekend.
Beer might not be your thing, which means the Cocktail Bar might be more likely to tick your box. If you consider yourself to be something of an intellectual then you might want to see what’s going on in the Literary Tent, or check out some Street Theatre. For those of you heading along with youngsters, the Legendary Kidszone will be a place worth checking out, as might the Art & Craft Village and the Games Tent. All of which is topped off by the presence delicious cuisine on offer from all around the world for your enjoyment.
Timings
One of the things that sets GuilFest apart from other festivals, other than the fact that it makes a conscious effort to be family-friendly to the point of searching bags to ensure that neither legal nor illegal highs are taken onto the Festival site, is the fact that there is no camping. As a result, you will need to head to the GuilFest site on the day or days that you’re attending and then head home at the end.
In terms of timings, the site opens at 11am on both days. The music gets underway not long after and carries on until 10pm, which is when it stops. The good news is that you can still head along to the bar for a drink for another hour or so, with the bar closing at 11pm before the Festival site shuts at midnight.