Country music singer Nathan Carter will headline the opening weekend of this year’s Lisdoonvarna Matchmaking festival.
The star will launch the festival along with fellow country musician Derek Ryan.
Thousands of singletons are expected to descend on Ireland’s matchmaking capital, especially for the gigs and Matchmaker Willie Daly will be on hand to help Nathan to find his match. The single star is said to be looking for someone with ‘a good personality, up for the craic and willing to travel.”
Third generation Matchmaker Willie Daly said: “There are a lot of lovely girls who are coming to Lisdoonvarna to meet Nathan. All he has to do is come to my matchmaking office and touch my lucky book and he certainly won’t go wrong.”
The vintage festival, now 160 years old and still going from strength to strength with over 60,000 people attending last year. Part of its charm is the friendly atmosphere in the town with people aged from 18 to 90 all mixing together.
Marcus White, managing director of the White Hotel group said: “We have a great tradition of country music here in Lisdoonvarna – it’s the music and the dancing which keeps people coming back to this festival year after year.”
“Nathan Carter is at the top of his game right now, with his own RTE series and on the verge of making it big in America. Getting someone of his calibre to launch the festival is a great boost for the town.
“As soon as we announced he was playing back in January, the phone has been hopping – I have never seen anything like it,” he added.
Supporting Derek Ryan at the Marquee in Lisdoonvarna on the Friday 2nd September will be Lisdoonvarna regulars Alan Kelly and ‘Outadiesel’. ‘Alan Kelly’ and ‘Blue Ridge country’ will be the support acts for Nathan Carter on Saturday 3rd September.
This year the event runs for over five weeks, from 2nd September until the 9th October and includes a great line up of entertainment, with a hen and stag party weekend on the 9th-11th September, three festival dance weekends on the 17-19th September, 25th-27th September and 1st – 3rd October and ‘The Outing’ LGBT weekend closing the festival on the 7th – 9th October.
Music and dancing take place in many venues around town from 12 midday to the small hours of the morning. For more information on the festival go to matchmakerireland.com