I finally made it to Celtic Colours this October. If you aren’t familiar with Celtic Colours, it’s basically THE Celtic festival in North America to be at (as far as I’m concerned anyway). I really should have stayed home and worked on pipe making, but I had promised others (you know who you are) that I’d be there, and who knows when I might ever make it back. Here’s a good little video to watch if you aren’t familiar with CC (actually its maybe a little annoying, but it does explain the festival and I’m in the video for 1.5 secs ):
Did you see me walk by with Ben Miller around 1:07?
My reaction to CC was “YOU SHOULD GO!” It was unbelievable. First of all, it was in Cape Breton in the Fall, so it’s a beautiful time to be in that neck of the world. Secondly, while many international musicians are present for the week, the core of CC is the local musicians. Each Concert (of which there were at least three scattered over the Island each night) consisted of several “acts” playing for forty-five minutes or so each. Time and time again, we’d go to a show for the international headliner, who’d be great, but the set we’d rave over was inevitably the local fiddler and piano player (or guitarist) just ripping through a mess of reels and jigs.
Beolach with Fin Moore and Angus Nicolson sitting in at the Festival Club
Without being too long-winded, each of the five days I was there consisted of going to a locally hosted community dinner (like homemade Roast Beef with mashed potatoes, turnip, peas, lovely yeast rolls and apple cobbler with ice cream!), then a show around 7:30, followed by attending the “Festival Club”, followed by the after party in the back room, followed by eating breakfast at 6:00 am and then going to bed and getting back up at 12-2 pm to start the whole process over again. It was pretty brutal, but I saw tons of folk at the festival club every night that were over 50 and there until closing at 3:30 in the morning (and up dancing for most most of it!).
After party in the Back Room
The festival Club, which began at 11:00 pm at the Hall of the Clans at the Gaelic College in St. Ann’s, was basically like a jazz club, but instead of drinking G and T’s or whatever and listening to jazz, you bought the local lagers and sat or danced to jigs and reels all night. And it was 4+ hours long! The musicians were the same musos playing at the concerts all week, but they got a shorter time slot and it was a bit more laid back.
I had a great time, got a couple of orders, and am crossing my fingers that I can make it again sometime in the next few years or so.
Ben Miller playing his new MacDougall Style Palo Santo Border pipes with the lads from Seudan
Marcel from Cuba and Niamh from Ireland who both attended CeltFest Cuba with me.
6:30am getting breakfast before bed.
