FOLLOWING on from Tradfest – well done Dónal and everyone involved – Féile and the Fleadh were mighty. Sixteen days of Féile An Phobail, separate but running parallel with a week of the first Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann to be held in Belfast. An 1.6 million Fleadh hoppers meandered their way through Belfast soaking up the music, the craic and the joyful atmosphere as musicians and dancers playing their hearts out on streets and in pubs and music venues.
Well done to all involved in organising this marvellous event. From Comhaltas first of all, and all the musicans and dancers, to Belfast City Council, to the Economy Minister Dr Caoimhe Archibald, who gave £1 million in funding in support of the Fleadh, to all of the business owners who opened their doors and provided the services that the crowds needed and enjoyed.
Well done also to the media. The local broadcast radio and television made a special effort, as did TG4. Together they broadcast hours of happy, smiling people appreciating the Fleadh, listening to the music and watching the dancers. And not forgetting Niall and Bronagh McClean and Ards Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann, the host branch for the Fleadh.
This fleadh was six years in the making but it paid off – big time. Not least in its social and societal benefits. I spent some time each day at the competitions in the Waterfront Hall. The standard of the music was amazing. Over 5,000 musicians from over 20 countries participated. That included a number of bands from the unionist and loyalist tradition. Fair play to them. They were warmly welcomed by enthusiastic crowds.
I have been going to Fleadhs whenever I could for more years than I care to remember. I have always been impressed by the passion and cheerfulness of the crowds and the musicians but I have to admit that I was a wee concerned that Belfast City might not accommodate the Fleadh in the same way as the smaller towns do. Would the Fleadh work in a city? As everyone now knows, it did. The craic was ninety. Belfast rose to the occasion. The city was hopping! Jumping with joy. Well done to all the performers. It was a great week and I for one am looking forward to Fleadh 2027.
The Féile was a great success also. Again. Well done to Kevin and the team. The huge numbers attending the concerts in the Falls Park are one obvious illustration of how well Féile is doing.
The art exhibitions in St Mary’s were amazing. Lots of local artists presenting their work to a steady stream of visitors. The presentation by John Samuelson of the Transport Workers Union along with Lorcan Collins on the life and times of Mike Quill was excellent, as was Colum Eastwood’s discussion with Tiernan Brady on the work to secure and win the unity referendums.
I also had an opportunity to meet up again with Sean O’Brien the General Secretary of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and his team who were in Belfast.
The hundreds of debates and discussions which make up Féile were all very well attended. I particularly enjoyed the ‘Women in Trade Unions and a New United Ireland’ discussion with Patricia McKeown and other women trade union leaders; the launch of Martina Anderson’s excellent book, Choosing the Struggle; Scribes at the West (West Club), hosted by Danny Morrison and featuring Leslie Wilson, Séamas O’Reilly, Wendy Erskine and Anna Carey; Kneecap’s charity gig – fair play, lads, a generous contribution to two Irish language projects: Glór na Móna’s Croí na Carraige and Seán Dolans GAC Irish language hub in Derry. And so much more.
No bonfires this year on August 9 in Belfast. Instead the Falls Road was packed with young people attending dance night. A far cry from the years when the night before August 9 – the anniversary of internment in 1971 – was a mix of bonfires and riots. It’s great to see the change.
So, comhghairdeas arís to everyone involved in the Féile and the Fleadh. You did us all proud and we look forward to 2027 with anticipation.
The heat is on and the world is failing to do what’s required
IT has been a summer thus far that tens of thousands of people in Europe and North America will remember for a long time to come. Climate change has exploded in a series of enormous and dangerous wildfires that have left devastation in their wake. Day after day the media is full of images of forests and farm land destroyed, homes in ruins and families living in makeshift shelters. From Spain to Greece and across Canada and the USA, the land burns as a result of prolonged heatwaves and droughts.
HOT TOPIC: The evidence of devastating climate change is overwhelming, but still some deny it. Photo rollingnews.ie
Of course, there are still those who poo-poo even the notion of climate change. But the evidence today is overwhelming and it’s not new.
As far back as the 1970s I recall warnings about the impact of pollution on the environment. In 1988 the United Nations established two UN agencies focused on climate change – the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), along with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
The IPCC published its first report in 1990 warning that global warming was real. It called for urgent action. In 2007 the then Secretary General of the UN Kofi Annan said: “The question is not whether climate change is happening, but whether, in the face of this emergency, we ourselves can change fast enough.”
In 2014 UN reports concluded that it is human activity that is the main cause of global warming. And in successive years report after report and conference after conference warned of the impact of global warming and its damage to society.
So far all of this has failed to deliver the measures needed as governments fail to respond with the urgency that is required. Consequently, wildfires are becoming more frequent, including on our island. Drought and extreme heat are increasingly commonplace in many places. Homes are destroyed, people killed, famine in parts of the world is getting worse, the financial cost of tackling climate change is growing and all the time wildfires are producing greater levels of carbon dioxide, a key contributor to the greenhouse effect.
Last month the UN Secretary General António Guterres warned “the climate crisis is in overdrive.” As one consequence of the wildfires and droughts, France, Britain and Spain have now promised to do more to reduce emissions and called on the world to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels. They also promised to do more to reduce emissions.
However welcome this is, thus far these and other states have failed to take decisive action. It will need the combined efforts of the nations of the world to meet the challenge of global warming.
Innocence lost
AMONG the Féile art exhibitions was one by John B. Vallely. JB is a renowned artist from Armagh City, a traditional musician and a great champion of the uilleann pipes. He has been painting for over 70 years and his exhibition at Féile focused on the loss of innocence; on the children killed at Wounded Knee by the US army in 1890 and the current Israeli genocide in Gaza in which tens of thousands of Palestinian children have been murdered.
Two images stand out in his remarkable exhibition. One is of a blue bird dedicated to Zintkála Nuni – the Little Lost Bird. It is symbolic of a baby girl who was found strapped to her murdered mother’s back four days after the massacre at Wounded Knee. She had survived four days in the snow. Her name was not known so she was named Zintkála Nuni – the Little Lost Bird.
The other is of a blue butterfly. It is representative of Hind Rajab, a five-year-old Palestinian child who spoke for three hours to Palestine Red Crescent dispatchers on a mobile phone. She was trapped inside a car with six of her relatives who had been killed by Israeli forces who fired hundreds of rounds into the vehicle. At one point she was asked by the dispatchers about her school and she told them that her class was called ‘the Butterfly Class’. Brian Vallely painted the blue butterfly for Hind.
The exhibition was an example of how art can emotionally connect with the individual. His paintings remain in the mind long after looking at them. All proceeds go to the Lakota and Palestinian causes.
