A BUMPER crowd of 20,000 people joined a massed sing-along to bring Oxfordshire’s longest-running festival to a traditional close.

Despite a series of torrential downpours, the crowd brought a rousing finale to the 30th anniversary of Cropredy Festival, which finished at midnight on Saturday.

Clutching tankards and umbrellas, the soaked audience gathered around the festival’s single stage for a three-hour set by folk-rock band Fairport Convention, who organize the event.

The three-day event came to a close with customary renditions of the band’s best-loved hits Matty Groves and Meet on the Ledge.

Even the rain failed to spoil the mood for music-lovers, who had travelled to the event, now officially known as Fairport’s Cropredy Convention, from as far afield as the USA and South Africa.

“Fairport were very good,” said regular Cropredy attendee Ruth Wilson, from Oxford. “It might be a bit self-indulgent to headline your own festival with a three-hour set, but they always get away with it. Johnny Logan, especially, was incredible. He has an amazingly powerful voice.

“The weather was generally awful, which was a shame because there’s absolutely nowhere to shelter and no marquees to huddle in, as at other festivals. But everyone made the best of it.

“All those tankards of real ale probably helped!”

Highlights included sets by rockers Status Quo, who delighted a Thursday night audience with a succession of their greatest hits, and avant-garde folk act Bellowhead, which boasts Abingdon squeeze box player John Spiers in its line-up.

Other names to win approval from the crowd were North Oxfordshire singer-songwriter Thea Gilmore, Coventry ska star Pauline Black, country-rock band Little Feat, dub reggae band Easy Star All Stars and up-and-coming stars Ahab – who were declared surprise favourites by many music-lovers.

Another familiar name to take to the stage was prog-rock keyboardist Rick Wakeman.

But it was hosts Fairport, whose members Dave Swarbrick and Dave Pegg, who used to live in the village, who proved the main attraction – serving up a familiar set of tunes dating back to the late 60s, with the help of a handful of special guests – including Dubliner Johnny Logan, who performed material from Celtic rock opera Excalibur.

Also joining his old band was fiddle player Swarbrick – who has been plagued by ill-health, and who, 11 years ago, was reported as having died. The musician read his obituary in the Daily Telegraph.

Musician Reid Morrison, frontman of band The Treetop Flyers, is another regular Cropredy-goer, on his third visit.

He also admitted the weather had taken some of the shine off the event, but insisted he would be back next year. “Fairport were good,” he said. “The musicianship was excellent. It was a shame about the weather, though what do you expect from England in August.”