We’re back! Well, we never went away, but we are really looking forward to welcoming choirs from all over the world to perform live once again in our beautiful city.
One of the many lessons that we’ve all learned over the past two years is to appreciate the value of making music together and the privilege of sharing that experience with others.
In October 2020, the festival was an entirely virtual presentation. Last year, we were able to return to having some live music events, but with restricted audience numbers and having to follow strict performance protocols.
This year we plan to return to an exciting presentation of a five-day festival on October 19-23, comprising gala concerts, a wide variety of live performance opportunities – both competitive and non-competitive – for singing groups of all shapes and sizes, workshops, discussion panels, massed choir singing, as well as the best elements of the on-line features from the past two festivals.
A major new element for our tenth festival is the introduction of a National Choir of the Festival. This competition will be held on the afternoon of Sunday 23 October and will feature the winners of the various national categories. You can check out the details of all performance opportunities in the following pages, including the special awards for national and international choirs, as well as a guide to the many attractions available to visitors.
We owe a huge debt of gratitude to all our funders and sponsors who have enabled the festival not just to survive over the past two years, but to grow and develop in terms of our local, national and international engagement.
We cannot wait to welcome old friends back to the festival and look forward to making many new choral friends in October 2022.
Dónal Doherty, Artistic Director
“What an amazing experience. Very professionally organised and a magnificent musical showcase!"
