Ennis Trad Festival brought a welcome influx of musicians and punters to the town last weekend.
On Friday, I looked in to the Old Gound were there was a pleasant buzz of anticpation with visitors toting instruments of various shapes were checking in. On Saturday , I had lunch in the packed Rowan Tree with my cousins Anne and Helen White We met chanteuse, Siofra Brock daughter of Paul and star of the West End , Helen Ball, dining with husband Lorcan and baby. Looking into Queens Bar there is a flurry of flautists and other assorted musicians tootling merrily away . On O Connell Street dodging the heavy showers, I meet travelling poet James Anthony Kelly and buy a copy of his poetry volume Porter and Emotion described as 'A vast diverse and varied collection' . How could you resist. I find it somehow reassuring that we still have travelling bards in Ireland .
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| Travelling Bard James A Kelly |
In Glór, I am just in time to watch the hapless presenter attempting to round up representatives of the runner ups who seemed reluctant to collect their prizes and eventually the winners , the Tulla Road Ceili Band (not to be confused with the Tulla Ceili Band) are eventually shepherded on stage to perform their valedictory set. While some of the punters in my vicinity had selected them, there was quite a few who felt Corofin Ceili Band also deserved the crown but there was a spirit of general good humour generally about the procedings and no one seemed to feel too hard done by.
