The Galway International Arts Festival launched the annual programme for its 48th summer extravaganza in Bohermore’s Dean Hotel this week.
Around 200 artists, influencers, officials, sponsors, politicians, academics, comics, journalists, liggers and luveens chewed canapés and sipped cocktails while pouring over the publication which unofficially marks the beginning of the city’s summer season.
“We have the national theatre, National Opera, national orchestra and National Gallery, but I feel the Galway arts festival is Ireland’s national festival,” said GIAF chairman Patrick Lonergan, professor of Drama and Theatre at University of Galway, who hinted planning has already begun for GIAF’s fiftieth anniversary in 2026.
Miriam Kennedy of Fáilte Ireland said last year the festival brought 300,000 visits to Galway, 25 per cent of which were foreign visits. “After what feels like eight months of winter, conversation in Galway turns to ‘What are you going to in the arts festival?’ not ‘Are you going to the arts festival?’. That’s an accomplishment,” she said.
GIAF chief executive John Crumlish said this year’s festival will have the most extensive music programme ever: “Who’d have thought we’d ever get from Trad to hiphop as Gaelige?” the Ulsterman asked rhetorically, no doubt referencing Belfast’s satirical rappers Kneecap who play the Heineken Big Top on Thursday, July 18.
“I often wonder what Galway would be like in July if we didn’t have this,” GIAF artistic director Paul Fahy pondered a counter-factual Galway amongst launch attendees.
Speaking to the Advertiser, Fahy said booking British electronic music pioneers Leftfield was probably the hardest act to pin down for 2024: “We’ve been talking to them for four or five years at this stage, but scheduling, our festival time-frame and their touring dates made it impossible... But we got ‘em.” Famed for volume that knocked plaster from the ceiling of the Brixton Academy (twice ), Leftfield play in Fisheries Field on Friday, July 19.
See page 42 for GIAF programme headlines
