Freedom on Tour brings a wheel of death, an acrobatic robot and street games to Bridlington Spa on Friday 4 September and Goole West Park on Tuesday 1 September, 11am to 5pm, free.

Hull’s Freedom Festival is sending five of its 2026 acts up the coast. Freedom on Tour plays outside Bridlington Spa on Friday 4 September and in West Park, Goole, on Tuesday 1 September, with a line-up running from 11am to 5pm on each day and no charge to watch. The organiser, Freedom Festival Arts Trust, lists the tour dates and the acts on its own site and says the shows are “completely FREE”. (Freedom Festival Arts Trust, Freedom on Tour 2026)

The two East Riding dates are part of a four-town run in what the trust calls the run-up to its main festival weekend in Hull. The trust’s published order is Grimsby (People’s Park, Monday 31 August), Goole (Tuesday 1 September), Tadcaster (The Barn, Thursday 3 September) and Bridlington (Friday 4 September). All four are free, and the trust adds the caveat that timings are “subject to change”. (Freedom Festival Arts Trust, Freedom on Tour 2026)

What is coming to Bridlington

The Bridlington line-up is Spinsane, Acrobot, The World Wanderer, BEYOND and Lilliput, performing at The Spa, South Marine Drive, YO15 3JH. Each is also on the Hull festival programme, and the trust’s own event pages describe them as follows. (Freedom Festival Arts Trust, Freedom on Tour 2026)

  • Spinsane (Race Horse Company): circus artists on a giant “wheel of death”, performing acrobatics as it spins. The trust bills it as suitable for the whole family. (Spinsane event page)
  • Acrobot (Dutch artist Daniel Simu): a juggler and circus artist performing alongside a self-built robotic acrobat, in a comic show about man versus machine. Simu built the first Acrobot prototype in 2022. (Acrobot event page)
  • The World Wanderer (Compagnie with Balls): a performer walking through the crowd balanced on a two-metre-high globe, in a 30-minute travelling piece. (The World Wanderer event page)
  • BEYOND (Circumstances): six acrobats climbing, balancing and dancing on an unstable field of ladders, choreographed by Piet Van Dycke. (BEYOND event page)
  • Lilliput (Tombs Creatius, Catalonia): a set of fairy-tale street games and puzzles for children and families to play, rather than watch. Tombs Creatius have brought earlier games shows to the Hull festival. (Lilliput event page)

Goole gets a slightly different bill on 1 September at West Park, Airmyn Road, DN14 6XA: Spinsane, Senescence, The World Wanderer, Otempodiz and Lilliput. Senescence is a solo circus piece inside a rolling ball of steel rings, by Rotterdam artist Camiel Corneille, and Otempodiz is a contemporary dance duet about time by the company ERTZA, founded in 2004. (Senescence event page, Otempodiz event page)

Freedom on Tour 2026: Grimsby Mon 31 Aug, Goole Tue 1 Sep, Tadcaster Thu 3 Sep, Bridlington Fri 4 Sep, then Freedom Festival Hull 3 to 6 Sep; the five acts at each East Riding date
Freedom on Tour 2026 dates and the East Riding line-ups. Source: Freedom Festival Arts Trust. Graphic by East Riding Today

The festival behind it

Freedom Festival is Hull’s annual outdoor arts festival. The 2026 edition runs 3 to 6 September with the theme of Peace, according to the trust’s festival director Phil Hargreaves in a March announcement, and the free outdoor programme in the city centre is concentrated on Saturday 5 and Sunday 6 September, when the same acts appear in Queen Victoria Square, Trinity Square, Whitefriargate and Humber Street. (Freedom Festival Arts Trust, four-year funding announcement, 12 March 2026; Freedom Festival 2026 programme)

The touring leg is funded as part of the trust’s year-round work. In March it announced a four-year grant from the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation for activity beyond the festival weekend, and its programme page describes Freedom on Tour as a consortium delivering international companies “across five towns, reaching around 4,500 people”. (Freedom Festival Arts Trust, funding announcement; Freedom Festival Arts Trust, programme)

The clash with the Tour of Britain

Friday 4 September is also the day the Lloyds Tour of Britain Men races through the East Riding, on a 194.1km stage from Hull that runs up the coast through Withernsea, Hornsea and Skipsea before turning inland at Burton Agnes towards Driffield and a finish at Beverley Racecourse. Bridlington itself is not on the published route, but the race passes through Skipsea and Burton Agnes, a few miles south and west of the town, and no closure timings had been published when we last checked. If you are driving in from Hornsea, Skipsea or the Driffield side that day, allow for it. Our Tour of Britain route story has the detail and will carry the timings once Hull City Council or the council publishes them.

What it means for you

  • Bridlington: Friday 4 September, 11am to 5pm, outside the Spa on South Marine Drive. Free, no ticket. Take the trust’s “timings subject to change” at face value and check its Freedom on Tour page on the morning for a running order.
  • Goole: Tuesday 1 September, 11am to 5pm, West Park. Same format, same “subject to change” caveat, and a different bill: Senescence and Otempodiz play Goole but not Bridlington; Acrobot and BEYOND play Bridlington but not Goole.
  • Lilliput is the one for small children. It is games to join in with rather than a show to sit through, so it suits toddlers who will not last a 45-minute circus set.
  • The Hull weekend is 5 and 6 September if you want the full programme, including the ticketed indoor shows that do not tour.
  • Check the East Riding roadworks and travel page before you set off for anything affecting the A165 or the A614 that week.

Every date, venue and act above is as published by Freedom Festival Arts Trust on 16 August 2026, and the trust’s line that timings may change applies to all of it.