Inspired by this year’s theme “Roots and Wings”, the festival features all facets of the arts including music, theatre, visual art, sculptures, films, poetry, literature, workshops, puppets, talks, walks, family fun and a dog show that is bigger and even better than last year! There is something for everybody.
This year’s musical highlights will include Dublin based band, Slow Moving Clouds. They bring together roots in the Irish and Nordic folk traditions, with post-punk drones, baroque strings, and soaring falsetto vocals creating an immersive, atmospheric sound unlike anything you’ve heard before.
CoCo and the Butterfields- “folk-hewn pop, with gliding guitars and a strident vocal” – Clash Music. Colourful, and energetic this band from the south of England, will have you dancing the night away.
The Higglers, from the hills of Clare offer old-time, pre-bluegrass, boogie music.
We also welcome The Howling Hecate, a Cork based duo formed by Americana folk artists Leah Sohotra and Hanora George. Take this opportunity to catch them, while they are still relatively unknown.
Once again, drama enthusiasts will be satisfied with three plays!
We look forward to a comic jaunt through James Joyce’s famous novel in ‘Strolling through Ulysses’ written and performed by Robert Gogan…
And… a rehearsed reading of Agnes of God by our local WayWord Theatre Company.
The children’s programme, this year is all about having fun, and will include puppets, arts and crafts workshops, face painting, fairy trail and fairy house building, water activities, inflatables, plus many other activities throughout the weekend.
This year it will be more than a festival – it is almost two festivals in one. A gathering of vintage barges will be basking in Mountshannon harbour – a floating fringe festival that will deliver a cargo of poetry, writing, and performance.
The barges will host a poetry – writing workshop with Angela T Carr and a writing workshop with Kevin McDermott. There will also be a special live broadcast of Scariff Bay Community Radio’s much loved programme, “A Flow of Words”.
Contributors will read their own poetry and prose alongside a chosen piece of music or song.
In addition to literary workshops, there will be workshops in botanical art painting with Shevaun Doherty, clay modelling with Jane Seymour, harp led by Tina Tourin, and leaf lantern workshops with Jana Zitzmann.
There will be several galleries open in the village, as well as Scariff Library, with exhibits including work from internationally acclaimed artists.
There will also be a special exhibition of portraits of local residents, by award winning photographer John Kelly, where he captures something of the history of the area, and the unique characters that have made their home in the Mountshannon/Whitegate parish.
For more information, visit wwww.mountshannonarts.net or find us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Brochures can be found in shops and establishments in the area.