There are some festivals in England which take place in a field or a park cut off from the outside world, mostly with big concerts and not much of a fringe - in the folk context Cambridge is a major example. I think it's a pattern that is more prevalent in other types of music in this country.

I used to go to Cambridge but haven't for some years, and that way of running a festival doesn't really appeal to me. Mind, the last time I went I remember taking part in a pretty good pub session outside the Festival Enclosure, so some kind of a fringe may have developed there.

The more typical pattern seems to be the one Susan of DT described for Whitby - a combination of sessions in pubs, concerts and dances in halls or marquees, and traditional display dance sides in the streets.

The balance varies, and all festivals I have been to seem to develop there own special character (and their own special characters). I've just got back from a first visit to Broadstairs this last week, following on Sidmouth which I've gone to for years. They are distinctly different, but are made of of essentially the same uingrediants.

And there are also mini-festivals based on individual pubs, typically with singing sessions in one part, and tune sessions in another, and a dance side or two in the street, when they aren't singing or playing, and maybe some more formal concert in a room or a tent.

The idea of a dry festival seems hard to imagine for anyone used to the English folk festivals. The same is true of the only Irish Fewetival I've been to, the Fleadh Ceoil, where the drink was a very major part of the fringe and the fringe was a major part of the festuval. The big differance there was the presence of masses of competitions of all sorts, right at the heart of the whole event, which is something pretty well absent from the English festivals generally.