World music veterans Afro Celt Sound System will be celebrating their fifteenth birthday when they appear at this year’s WOMAD festival which starts today and runs until Sunday.

The band has a long association with founder Peter Gabriel and has performed at all the other WOMAD festivals around the world. This will be their first appearance at Charlton Park, near Malmesbury, when they take to the stage on Sunday night.

Multi instrumentalist James McNally said the WOMAD audience was one of his favourites.

He said: “Our first show together was at WOMAD in 1995.

“It is fantastic to be celebrating 15 years together by going back home to our birthplace.

“It has a special atmosphere, people there really know their music.

“It has got quite diverse over the years and they are very open minded about different kinds of music.

“I recommend WOMAD to people all the time.”

To create the band’s eclectic sound they fuse modern dance rhythms like techno and trip hop with traditional Irish and West African music.

The band was invited to a recording session at Peter Gabriel’s studio in 1995 and have since released six albums on his Real World Records label.

They have since performed alongside a host of other artists such as Sinead O’Connor, Robert Plant and Gabriel himself.

Former member of The Pogues, McNally said: “Our work is all about collaboration. It was great working with Peter on our third album.”

The band has also featured on soundtracks for the films Gangs of New York, Hotel Rwanda and Stigmata among others.

This year’s WOMAD festival will coincide with the release of their greatest hits album marking 15 years together.

McNally said: “We had so much material to fit in we made it a double album.

“One CD is of regular songs, the other instrumentals.

“We hope to have it at WOMAD and it will be officially launched in September.”