Dancers like these are competing in Philly this weekend.
It being Thanksgiving weekend, downtown Philadelphia is alive with the sound of Irish music. The Mid-Atlantic Oireachtas (o-rock-tas), the regional Irish dance championships, draws dancers from Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, and Delaware to Philly each year for three days of hard-fought competition. It’s fun to watch even if you don’t have a dancer competing. Actually, I think it’s more fun if you don’t–it must be tense for the moms and dads.
Next weekend, American Celtic Christmas comes for the third time to Bensalem High School. Featuring Jamison, John Byrne, Raymond Coleman, Bob Hurst of the Bogside Rogues, singer Kim Killen, and more than 100 dancers and other performers.
The John Patrick Shanley play, “Outside Mullingar,” is continuing its run at the Suzanne Roberts Theatre on South Broad Street in Philadelphia.
Also continuing: the going-out-of-business sale at McKenna’s Irish Shop in Havertown, where new discounts are in effect.
Barlyejuice is playing the World Café Live on Saturday night at 8 PM. Jamison is at Curran’s Tacony starting at 9:30 PM Saturday.
On Sunday, Gabriel Donohue, John Byrne and other musicians will be playing live in studio for the last pledge drive of the year for WTMR’s “Come West Along the Road” Irish Radio Hour, which starts at noon. The station is at 800 AM and is available online.
On Wednesday, Paul Byrom of Celtic Thunder will be on stage at the Sellersville Theatre where he’ll be performing tunes from his holiday album, “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” to get you in the mood.
On Friday, Carbon Leaf, the Virginia-based indie band known for its folk- and Celtic-infused rock, will be at World Café Live.
Also on Friday, the City Theater Company is producing James Joyce’s “The Dead” at The Black Box at OperaDelaware Studios in Wilmington, DE.
Along with An American Celtic Christmas next weekend, keep three other events on your radar:
First-rate trad fiddler Kevin Burke will be performing solo at the Coatsville cultural Society in Coatesville on Saturday night.
The Philadelphia Rose Center’s Christmas Celebration on December 7 at The Saturday Club in Wayne, featuring arts and crafts, music by Karen Boyce McCollum and “The Lads” (Pat Close and Pat Kildea), and a special visit from Santa who is sure to be upstaged by International Rose of Tralee, Maria Walsh, because, well, she’s charming and she can do that.
The Divine Providence Village Rainbow Irish Step Dancers, a group of developmentally disabled women who live at the Catholic institution in Elverson, will hold their Christmas recital at the Masonic Lodge in Prospect Park on Sunday, Dec. 7, from 2:30 to 5 PM. Doors open at 1:30 for a baked goods sale and Santa will be available to hear your wish list from 1:30 to 2:15, when he’s expected elsewhere.
