ARTISTS from all around the globe will be descending on North Wiltshire for the county’s annual WOMAD extravaganza.

With just over a week to go before the first act takes to the stage, the final touches are being made for the World of Music, Arts and Dance festival.

Some of the stand out names appearing at the festival, founded by Peter Gabriel, include Leftfield, Macka B and Jazzanova, featuring Paul Randolph. Clifford Joseph Price MBE – aka Goldie – will make his debut at WOMAD.

Taking to the WOMAD turntables in the Big Red Tent will be dance music pioneer Gilles Peterson, who makes a long overdue return.

His set will no doubt be a glorious fusion of soul, jazz, hip-hop, house and everything in between, brimming with passion and sound.

Bringing musical mastery and a whole lot of fun to the Big Red Tent is the terrifically versatile outfit The Herbaliser, experts in fusing together jazz, hip-hop and breaks, and once again teaming up with one of their long-time collaborators, the rapper RODNEY P, for a very special WOMAD set.

After joining friends Blue Lab Beats on stage at WOMAD 2017 for an energetic, powerful set, spoken-word poet and multimedia artist Kojey Radical is back, this time making his solo debut on the Siam Stage.

His work spans every genre possible and he excels at every one of them; from music to visual arts to poetry, the British-Ghanaian Londoner uses rich, fearless lyrics and imaginative beats to create a brilliant, unprecedented sound.

Unlikely dance music hero Omar Souleyman will be hitting the Open Air Stage; a wedding singer from Syria whose four-to-the-floor anthems, produced in collaboration with Four Tet, have won him acclaim across the world – and admirers in the form of Björk and Caribou.

Some of the other performers are from BCUC, South Africa, House of Waters, USA/Japan/Argentina, Maâlem Hamid El Kasri, Morocco, Mélissa Laveaux, Canada/Haiti, My Baby, Netherlands/New Zealand and JM y Juanín & Los Crack del Puerto from Chile, among others.

WOMAD Festival has also confirmed that there is a new drum and bass Soundscape stage this year.

Named after the flagship sound system that industry moguls, drum and bass audiotechnik, have pioneered, Soundscape takes sound back to its basic, primal roots.

With the incredible sound system as a backdrop, a phenomenal set of artists take to the stage, with each set following a set of themes that will run throughout the weekend. Experimental composition and performance, artists in conversation, new jazz flavours, the fusion of music and technology and late-night dancing set the musical agenda.

Visit http://womad.co.uk/ for full details of all acts performing.