Thousands of people flooded through the gates of Pembroke Castle for their 2016 concert weekend.

Friday’s concert kicked-off with a brilliant performance from seven-piece local band Tuxedo Funktion, followed by a fantastic show from Pop-Up Bowie, whose front man, Paul Antony, was winner of the 2013 National Tribute’s UK Number 1 Tribute Award. The headlining act, and Official #1 Abba Tribute Show, Revival/The Tribute to ABBA, had the whole crowd up on its feet singing along to classic ABBA hits, with many fans in full costume.

Saturday starred brilliant performances from local performer Jodie Marie, and Blackwood’s Into the Ark, who caught the attention of both Jamie Lawson and Calum Scott, with Jamie Lawson joining the crowd to watch their performance.

Many visitors raved about the performance of Calum Scott, 2015 Britain’s Got Talent star, whose single ‘Dancing on My Own’ has been flying high in the UK singles chart. On top of his evident musical ability, he showed himself to be fantastic with the crowd, spending a good half an hour signing autographs and posing for photographs with fans. The evening came to a close with the eagerly expected headlining performance of Jamie Lawson, number one album artist discovered by superstar Ed Sheeran, first artist signed to Ed’s Gingerbread Man Records label. He is best-known for his single Wasn’t Expecting That, which in May this year won an Ivor Novello Award for best song musically and lyrically. Jamie announced to the crowd that Pembroke Castle was not only an amazing setting, but has been the largest headlining concert of his career. After the concert, he told fans on his Facebook page that he ‘loved every minute of it.’

The Sunday concert proved to be the highlight of the weekend. Headlined by Jools Holland and His Rhythm and Blues Orchestra, the picnic style concert sold out within 48 hours of going on sale in November last year. The castle was filled to the rafters with concert-goers and their picnic hampers, who were treated to a breath-taking night of music from Pauline Black and Arthur ‘Gaps’ Hendrickson from legendary two-tone band, The Selecter; Ruby Turner, Louise Marshall, Beth Rowley and Sonia Bernardo. Jools Holland had the crowd in the palm of his hand, and really made the most of the unique setting of Pembroke Castle.

Castle manager Jon Williams commented: “The whole weekend was a great success and that was because of a lot of hard work put in by our brilliant team of staff and contractors. We’re really pleased that so many came out to support the weekend and had such a good time.”