Posted By: Editor
June 28, 2026
TOR-VYBZ
TORBAY’S FIRST YOUTH-LED GRASSROOTS MUSIC FESTIVAL
Saturday 18 July 2026 * 11:00 – 20:00 * FREE ENTRY
The Banjo, Princess Gardens, Torquay
Tor-VYBZ is Torbay’s first youth-led grassroots music festival, created & delivered by young people with the support of Sound Communities CIC.
Taking place at The Banjo, one of Torquay’s most recognisable seafront spaces, the event brings contemporary youth culture into a historic civic setting to connect Torbay’s heritage with the next generation of local creativity. It will inspire a cultural shift to a creative economy within the Bay.
More than a one-day festival, Tor-VYBZ is designed as a place-shaping cultural initiative: building opportunities for young people, strengthening Torbay’s creative economy and contributing to the Bay’s identity as a vibrant place to live, work and visit.
RE-IMAGINING: TORBAY
A vibrant economy is an absolute priority for Torbay.
The Tor-VYBZ festival will contribute to this in many ways, producing an Economic Report on its impact that maps footfall, value, and circulated income. A returning festival would be a commitment to community wealth-building, giving young people local opportunities, offering short employment supply lines, and providing a creative and cultural asset that pools generated income to ensure it remains in
the Bay.
Young people will benefit directly as well as through associated uplifts. Creative and cultural offers have positive impacts on mental health expenditure (poor economic inactivity and poor health is estimated to cost £16,000 per inactive person annually). Tor-VYBZ will also give young people meaningful experience on which to gain employment in the creative industries.
Our aim is to create a returnable festival that embeds a cultural economic uplift through attracting young professionals into the Bay, retention of young people who already live here, and through the establishment of an annual cultural event that adds value to Torbay’s tourism offer.
This festival draws on our extensive experience in developing Youth Leadership, the creative arts and delivery of Sound Futures (our high impact employability programme for young people who may be far from traditional career pathways).
Tor-VYBZ is helping participants move towards education, employment and enterprise.
