A HOMEGROWN music festival with an environmentally-friendly message returned to West Oxfordshire this weekend.

Tandem Festival again rocked up at Lower Farm in Ramsden near Witney from Friday to Sunday, with a wide variety of music from across the globe.

The forth annual event was organised by Tandem Collective, a not-for-profit Community Interest Company that encourages new audiences to tackle environmental and social issues through music and the arts.

This year’s headliners were Tantz, Perhaps Contraption, Raka, Peter and Kerry, Paddy Steer and Iyatra Quartet.

They formed part of a programme of music from funk to a full orchestra and ‘Balkan beats’ to late-night DJs, as well as folk musicians from around the world.

Tandem co-founders Nina Brown and Niko O’Brien said they were proud of the line-up but said that the festival was about more than just the music.

Ms Brown said: “Tandem is all about creative people working together and the festival highlights the incredible work of Oxfordshire-based community organisations, local artists and makers and the county’s charities and social enterprises.”

The festival site is constructed by community volunteers and built almost entirely from recycled materials. Organisers said they wanted Oxfordshire to become ‘a hub for creative responses to climate change’.

Mr O’Brien added: “The festival build uses scrap wood from the Oxford Wood Recycling project, we save electrical goods and furniture from landfill and we use a lot of material from the Orinoco Scrapstore.

“We are also really excited about our new partnership with Abingdon and Witney College which is providing a free skill-share programme for volunteers.

“Volunteers are learning skills such as carpentry and building with recycled materials, cooking for large numbers using food waste, upcycling, sign painting and composting.”

As well as live music there was also a host of talks, workshops, film, dance and food stalls on offer.

While the takings for this year’s festival are yet to be confirmed tickets in February were sold at record pace, despite organisers launching a crowdfunding campaign in August to raise funds to break even after last year’s event.

No official announcement has been given but the annual event is expected to return again next year.

For further information on the festival visit tandemcollective.org