The 14th Annual Con Curtin Music Festival will be held in Brosna on this very weekend from this evening, Friday, June 27th to Sunday, June 29th! There will be traditional music sessions throughout the weekend with top class musicians from all over Ireland in attendance. First held in June 2001 to mark the life-time, musical achievements of one of the village’s most colourful characters, Con Curtin.
It was at the prompting of Jimmy Deenihan, TD – and now Minister for the Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht – that the festival came into being at all. It was unique in those first seven or eight years in that the subject of the festival was alive and well able to take a full and active part in it up to the time of his passing in April 2009.
This year the festival has been included in the long time planned and recently launched Sliabh Luachra Music Trail. This is a joint initiative involving the Arts Offices of Cork and Kerry County Councils.
Sliabh Luachra is associated with a very specific and idiomatic traditional music style and through the development of the Sliabh Luachra Music Trail the aims are to celebrate this tradition. Among the objectives include a range of measures that aim to promote and preserve the region’s unique musical heritage.
It’s key objectives include: The celebration of the musical heritage of Sliabh Luachra; To promote cultural and creative tourism in Sliabh Luachra; To create opportunities for and stimulate an interest in the performance of Sliabh Luachra music; The development of an education programme to encourage interest and participation in Sliabh Luachra Music.
The Sliabh Luachra Music Trail involves local festival committees working together to create a year round programme of events including concerts, workshops, master classes and lectures.
Con Curtin Festival 2014 Line-Up
The workshops begin on Saturday morning at 11am in the national school. There will be tutors for a variety of instruments including banjo, concertina, fiddle, accordion, flute, singing and sean nos dance. At 2.30pm there will be a concert in the hall featuring a selection of workshop participants and At 4pm all accordion players are invited to take part in the Aneas O’Connell Memorial Trophy. A traditional mass will take place in the church 8pm and this is proceeded by a house session in the Ciss kitshen which will feature some of her finest Sliabh Luachra musicians including Donal O’Connor, Nicky McAuliffe, Ann McAuliffe, Mary Crowley and John Connolly. This event is sponsiored by the Sliabh Luachra Music Trail.
On Sunday there will be street busking from 2pm followed by a Ceili with Donie Nolan and the Taylors Cross Ceili Band and a singing session in Flanagan’s Bar at 5pm. Of course, there’ll be music sessions throughout the village over the course of the weekend.
For all and any information on the weekend’s activity in Brosna check out their site at: www.concurtin.com.
