A MUSIC festival has been granted a licence despite concerns from environmental health officers that it could cause too much noise.

The Bangers & Mash-Up Festival, to be held at the United Downs race track, had applied for a premises licence for the event to allow for live music and the sale of alcohol.

However, concerns about the application had been raised by Cornwall Council’s environmental protection officers due to noise from the event.

When the event was last held in 2019 the council received seven complaints from people living nearby about the noise.

Environmental protection officer Mark Hitchens told the council’s licensing act sub-committee that while the number of complaints was small there were not many people living in the area and he said that in such a rural location it should be expected to be quiet.

Georgina Braines, who had applied for the licence, said that the festival was not all about music and organisers had made changes from the previous event to address noise complaints.

She said: “Bangers and Mash-Up is not a music festival as such, it is an opportunity for people to experience art, science and fashion and all the other things that people miss out on down here as they are busy working, providing for other people.”

Georgina explained what had been done following the complaints after the 2019 event: “We had an area there that had some young people’s music, dance music, we have dispensed of that entirely.

“There will not be any low frequency bass music, no dance music or horrible beats.”

She explained that all music had been moved into the “bowl area” of the site and there would be 12ft-tall sound barriers in place to prevent noise around the local area.

And she said that while the licence was for entertainment until 11pm all music and activity would end by 10.30pm “as we feel that is late enough”.

She said that the festival would be happy to have noise levels lower than the last event and also explained that many of the performers were acoustic or acapella acts and so would not be amplified too loudly.

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Among the artists included on a line-up provided to the council are Three Daft Monkeys, Neville Staples and Tankus The Henge.

Mr Hitchens said that he was concerned that the event would not be able to meet licensing objectives around public nuisance due to the noise.

He and his colleagues had suggested that the event should be reduced to just a two-day event to minimise disruption.

The organisers of the event had agreed to six conditions suggested by council officers which included limiting noise levels, providing a sound management plan and employing an acoustic consultant.

Committee members agreed to grant the licence and said that it would be for the three-day event saying that they did not believe that by allowing three days would breach licensing objectives.

They said that the application was subject to the conditions which had previously been agreed by the organisers.