Ossyfest is a 4-day music festival based in pubs and bars around Oswaldtwistle featuring music from local artists, both known and unknown. The event aims to provide a platform for musicians from the local area while raising money for Free Music Lessons CIC and supporting the venues of the local area.
Ossyfest is held in August each year, since 2022. The 2026 event will take place between the 6th and 9th of August.
There are no tickets to purchase as the event is free, but we do ask for an optional donation to Free Music Lessons CIC, which can be made upon entry to a participating venue either by cash or card.
Free Music Lessons is a community interest company organisation established 5 years ago with the aim of helping to bridge the gap of music education within schools local to Oswaldtwistle and the surrounding areas. As you can tell with the name, FML provides free music tuition to young people who otherwise would not be able to access it.
To date FML has provided thousands of lessons to young people, covering choir, guitar, drums, ukelele and more.
Donations can be made in person during the Ossyfest weekend through any of our volunteers that you’ll see at each venue. Alternatively we will be adding an online donation option very soon!
While we cannot guarantee any performance slots, if you’d like to register your interest, please click here and complete the form and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
Similarly, as a small group of organisers (with big dreams for the event in years to come), extra hands are always useful to help with coordination during the festival weekend. Click the link and submit your interest if you want to help out!
Yes! We wholeheartedly welcome volunteers for the festival weekend. Whether that is helping on the doors and taking donations, helping move equipment and sorting logistics, photographing bands or selling merch, we always need extra pairs of hands.
If you’re interested click this link and fill in the form by selecting ‘volunteer’ and we’ll reach out to you.
In 2026 we have 19 venues involved across Oswaldtwistle (and Church!) to support the event.
The majority of venues are pubs and bars you’d expect, such as The Black Dog and Tap Select, but we also have some other exciting performance areas including Rhyddings Park and Ossy Immanuel Cricket Club.
For the full list of participating venues, click here.
Our lineup for 2026 has been announced and can be found on our lineup page here!
This is our biggest lineup yet, with over 70 acts performing across the 4 days. We have some familiar faces such as Kurt Lloyd, Kayleigh Hall and Tryptik, along with some new talent like The Lavelles, Atlas and Loose Talk.
Details about performance times will announced in due course. Keep your eyes on the site or our social media accounts!
We also have a live updating scheduler which will be made available over the festival weekend so you know exactly who is playing when and where on each day.
Yes! As the event itself is free you can come and go as you please, but beware that if a venue reaches it’s capacity we may have to limit to one out/one in.
No, as most of the venues are pubs, bars or restaurants you are not able to bring your own food and drinks.