THEY backed Ian Dury on Clever Trevor, Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick and Sex and Drugs and Rock ’n’ Roll but now the Blockheads are coming to Devizes to share their witty Cockney rock as part of Devizes Festival.

Now fronted by Derek Hussey, the Blockheads will play at the Corn Exchange on Friday, June 6 when they will reprise some of their 1970s hits, including What a Waste and Reasons to be Cheerful Part 3 as well as tracks from their recent album, Same Horse Different Jockey.

TV historian Dr David Starkey will discuss his favourite topic, The Tudors and Us, at the Corn Exchange on Saturday, June 21.

As a broadcaster he has won a reputation for abrasiveness and ruthless interrogation of witnesses on Radio 4’s The Moral Maze but it is his TV series on Elizabeth I, the six wives of Henry VIII and the Channel 4 series Monarchy that have made him a household name.

If you like comedy, satire and impressionists you will get it all in one show when Luke Kempner performs his impressions comedy The Only Way is Downton at the town hall on Sunday, June 22. Having made his name with YouTube hit Downstairs at Downton and appearances in musicals such as Les Miserables and Avenue Q, Mr Kempner’s debut solo show won critical acclaim at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Speaking of Scotland, poet Liz Lochhead will read her own work at the town hall on Sunday, June 8, the latest in a long line of celebrity versifiers to visit the festival.

On the musical side, Bath Camerata will give a concert at St Mary’s Church on Saturday, June 7, a chance to see how the redundant church works as a community venue. Nigel Perrin formed the choir in 1986.

A subject close to all our hearts given the dreadful weather over the past few months, climate change and the Atlantic jet stream will be the topic for discussion at Café Scientific, this year taking place at 1 Spice in Maryport Street, where the audience can enjoy a curry supper after an intense discussion led by Dr Tim Woollings, lecturer in Physical Climate Science at the University of Oxford and a contributing author of the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

The festival brochure will be published in April and tickets will go on sale in May.