THE organisers of Porthleven Food Festival have been criticised for allegedly disrespecting Cornish traditions after cutting short a local choir in the middle of them singing Trelawny.

A member of the Cadgwith Singers Stephen Polglase says the choir was booked to perform at the food and music festival for an hour yesterday evening in the marquee on the Harbour Head.

He says they were scheduled to go on at 6.30pm and perform for an hour but after half an hour he says they were asked to stop and they 'reluctantly' finished with Trelawny but during the last verse the singing was interrupted by a "head banging" beat from a local restaurant which switched on the music again.

"We performed to an enthusiastic crowd for half an hour and then we're asked to stop much to the annoyance of the packed crowd who were baying for us to continue," he said in a Facebook post. "We reluctantly finished with Trelawney. During the last verse the head banging beat started again with complete disregard to the Cornish anthem.

"If you are going to stage a festival in future you need to think about the title. Many members of the Cadgwith singers had rushed from another venue that we had been singing at to perform at the festival only to be told halfway through the performance to stop at the whim of some individual, who was purportedly in charge, which was an affront.

"What you are actually staging is a food and head banging festival which is fine but don't try and dress it up as a music festival."

But the organisers were defended by local boy and former deputy mayor of Penzance Nigel Pengelly. Mr Pengelly, who owns Pengelly's Porthleven Gin which he was selling at the festival, said this may have just been a case of "poor communication".

"As sad as this is - every performer should be allowed the decency to perform in their allotted time slot - this may be a case of poor communication. I very much doubt if this was intended to be disrespectful. The DJs below were probably told they could start at 7.30pm and had no idea that the Cadgwith Singers were still performing. This can, and should be, rectified.

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He added: "As a proud Cornishman, I hate to hear the song of my country interrupted. Actually, I'm going to volunteer to be a steward next year with the sole aim of making sure that the choir performance is not played over by the DJs below.

"If you want to discuss this with me, I'll be at the Pengelly's Porthleven Gin stand on the right-hand side of the harbour from around midday onwards."

A spokesperson for Porthleven Food Festival said: “We’ve had an overwhelmingly positive three days at the Festival with lots of people enjoying fun and great food.

"As organisers we put a lot of time and energy into the Festival and we’re devastated about the issue that the Cadgwith Singers had with their set being cut short, particularly as it was during the Cornish anthem which we all understand the importance of.

“We always seek to learn from every event and unfortunately there was a breakdown in communication in this instance.  We're so pleased to share that they have accepted our apology and we are looking forward to welcoming them back to the festival next year."

The food festival continues today until 10pm.