Welcome to the Féile Frank Mc Gann website. The aim of this site is to promote the memorial festival of Irish traditional music, song and dance taking place from 9th to 12th October 2008, in Strokestown, Co. Roscommon.

We held our fifth festival last October, it again exceeded our expectations, a difficult task following the success of the previous years.

The ongoing success of the festival is due to the fact that Frank Mc Gann was a widely known and charismatic figure in Irish Music, and the fact that Strokestown is a great town to hold a festival.

Several thousand people attended the many events over the weekend last year, and with Sean Keane, John & James Carty, Arcady, Buttons & Bows and the Shaskeen, Strokestown was full to the brim with musicians and with sessions springing up all over the place. The workshops and the competitions were again very successful.

This year’s festival promises to be as exciting as the previous five with an exciting line-up of musicians and singers. Saturday night will feature one of the hottest concerts in the country featuring the trad superstars 4 Men and a Dog and The Mulcahy Family.

The Friday night recital will feature the talents of Button Accordion player, James Keane who will coming all the way from the US to perform at a very special recital in Strokestown Park House. This ‘musician’s musician’ promises to treat us to an unmissable highlight of the festival. We’ll turn the lights down low, light the fire, and serve a complementary glass of wine to really get you into the mood.

(remember – never ever drink and drive!)

Continuing ‘ The Kitchen Sessions’ theme at the Park House on Sunday afternoon, we have a real treat in store with Dordàn. Galway musicians Mary Bergin, Dearbhaill Standun and Kathleen Loughnane, collectively known as Dordàn, are highly acclaimed musicians who perform a distinctive and exciting mix of traditional Irish and European music. The diversity of their musical interests is reflected in their wide ranging repertoire which includes the liveliest of Irish reels, jigs and haunting slow airs, as well as work by the European baroque composers all their music is arranged and adapted by the group members and emerges with a very exciting sound and a distinctly Irish feel.

Building on a tradition over the last five years of bringing top artistes to Strokestown, Féile Frank McGann are delighted and honoured to welcome The Kilfenora Ceili Band for our Ceili Mòr 2008. The Kilfenora are sure to set the feet tapping and, with a high profile array of workshop tutors, talks as well as music and singing sessions planned for the weekend, you will undoubtedly be treated to the very best weekend of the year.

We hope to again see many of the new friends we met last year, from Norway, Japan, England, Scotland, Wales, USA and all over Ireland. If you didn’t make it last year, and want to finish this year in style, why not pay a visit to Strokestown. You’ll be sure of the warmest welcome together with the best music and craic in the country.

See you there!

- Brian, Anne, Mairead, Margaret, Eugene, Mary, Danny and all our helpers & volunteers.