It’s shaping up to be bitterly cold this weekend. Wouldn’t you rather be inside? Well, you’re in luck! The 24th Annual Greater Philadelphia Mid-Winter Scottish and Irish Music Festival and Fair is this weekend, launching Friday night with a concert featuring the wild Scottish percussion band Albannach as well as our own homegrown wild men, The Hooligans. And it’s all happening inside at the Valley Forge Events Center in King of Prussia.
Check the event’s website for a complete lineup with times so you can make your plans.
You’ll see Gerry Timlin with partner Tom Kane at the festival, and Timlin will be going solo Saturday night at what’s shaping up to be THE place to hear Irish music in the region, the Dubliner on the Delaware in New Hope. Timlin will be going on at 8 PM. And, frankly, all night, because that’s the way he is. (He knows we love him.)
The Shantys are holding their Valentine’s Day party on Sunday afternoon at Pub36 on Frankford Avenue, while Jamison will be playing for lovers and others at Paddy’s Whacks on Welsh Road at Roosevelt Boulevard starting at 9.
Larry Kirwan, front man of the New York-based Irish punk rock band Black 47, who is also a playwright and author, will be performing and speaking about the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin at Barnaby’s Aston in Media on Thursday. The program is sponsored by Neumann University. Neumann students can get in free, and others must pay $5. Kirwan hosts Celtic Crush, a radio show on the Sirius Satellite Network, and writes a weekly column for the Irish Echo newspaper. He hails from County Wexford.
That same evening, Slainte will be on stage at Pub36.
On Friday, the event that hundreds are waiting for: the Delco Gaels’ Dancing Like a Star fundraiser at the Springfield Country Club in which eight amateur dancers compete to help bring in needed funds to support the youth Gaelic sports club. There’s still time to get tickets, though the 700-person venue sells out every year. Go to the Gael’s website to order. No tickets are sold at the door.
Tyrone musician Raymond Coleman will be playing and singing at O’Mare’s Irish Pub on Buselton Avenue in Philadelphia on Friday night.
Coming up in a few weeks: The Irish American Business Chamber and Network is honoring one of its own. Founder Bill McLaughlin and his wife and business partner Natalie will receive the Taoseich (Leader) Award at the 2016 Ambassador Awards at the Union League on February 26. Also being honored: Almac Group, a Northern Irish drug research company with North American headquarters in Souderton, and Msgr. Michael Doyle, pastor of Sacred Heart Church in Camden. For more information, check our calendar or the Chamber’s website.
Also the end of this short month: The first Philadelphia St. Patrick’s Day parade fundraiser at the FOP Hall in Northeast Philadelphia, scheduled for February 28. And you know what that means. . .March madness is on its way.
