ABINGDON Market Place will be rocking with music and colour on Saturday.

The town is hosting the sixth annual Yeah Baby! music festival, organised by Abingdon charity the Amber Phillpott Trust.

James Phillpott and Fleur Tinson founded the charity after losing their 18-month old daughter Amber to acute myeloid leukaemia (AML) in 2011.

Mr Phillpott will perform Highlife, a song he wrote for his daughter, on the Market Place stage with his band The Benbows.

The stage will be headlined by BBC’s The Voice contestant Luciee Marie Closier and former Supergrass member Mick Quinn’s The DB band.

Mr Phillpott said: “This year’s event is all about the music, with a great line-up of local talent.

“For the first time we have got two big-name acts. The momentum is just growing and growing.

“I am pleased so many people come forward each year saying they want to help.”

Amber Phillpott was born on September 5, 2009, a second daughter to Mr Phillpott and Ms Tinson, who live in Winterborne Road with their daughter Daisy, seven.

In October 2010 Amber suffered a minor stroke.

At Oxford John Radcliffe’s Children’s Hospital she was diagnosed with AML, a rare form of blood cancer, and began chemotherapy.

Treatment failed and Amber died on March 5, 2011.

The Amber Phillpott Trust has since raised £60,000 towards research into the cancer.

Yeah Baby! also raises money for Helen and Douglas House children’s hospice, in East Oxford, Oxford Children’s Hospital and its overnight facility for parents of sick children, Ronald McDonald House.

In the past five years the festival has raised £35,000 for the charities. This year organisers hopes to “smash” their £40,000 target.
Download Highlife for 79p from amberphillpott.com

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