Banjo Fest takes over Tullamore

The Johnny Keenan Banjo Festival kicked off last night (Thursday) and is set to take over the town of Tullamore as events are held throughout the town over the four-day event. Running from September 20 to 23, the 11th Annual Johnny Keenan Banjo Festival will see nightly concerts and workshops at the Tullamore Court Hotel, craft stalls and free open air concerts in O'Connor Square on the Saturday and Sunday, as well as street and pub sessions all over Tullamore and busking competition on the streeets. While it is the 11th year of the festival, it is the first time for Tullamore to host it and organiser Christine Keenan explained that they needed a bigger town with more facilities to host the festival. The festival is held in memory of Christine's husband Johnny Keenan, a renowned musician, and Christine explains that it is about so much more than banjos. "It brings together the very best of Irish traditional music and American bluegrass and folk," she said, explaining that it features musicians who play a variety of instruments, as well as great singer songwirters and musicians will travel from America and Europe to join with Irish musicians for the four-day festival. Performers playing at the festival's nightly concerts include the Barcelona Bluegrass Band, Suzy Bogguss and Don Rigsby & Charlie Sizemore as well as Ireland's own Paul Brady and Offaly's own Mundy. A busking competition will also be held throughout the town over the course of the festival, with one band travelling from America to participate in this. The winner will open the Sunday concert as well as playing at a gig in Joe Lee's that night and there will also be a cash prize. Christine told the Offaly Independent this week that the venues in Tullamore had been really enthusiastic and co-operative in helping to run the festival, ensuring that the whole town is involved, with sessions, gigs, workshops and craft stalls. She said that she hopes locating the festival in Tullamore will allow it to grow and develop. It injected an estimated €1m into Longford town's economy in past years, and a similar or increased amount is expected to be injected into Tullamore's economy during this year's festival that's bigger and better than its predecessors. Tickets and weekend passes as well as further information is available by logging on to www.johnnykeenan.com.