Fleadh CheoiI na hEireann, as the name
suggests, is a festival celebrating Irish music, song, dance and culture held on and
around the last weekend of August annually. Organised by Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann
(CCE), the Fleadh is held to coincide with the U.K. Bank Holiday to facilitate the large
numbers of visitors from Britain who attend the Fleadh each year. In any year, over the
week, the Fleadh will attract between 130,000 to 150,000 people to the host area.
The First Fleadh was organised by The Pipers' Club
from Dublin and held in Mullingar on Whit weekend 1951 in conjunction with "Feis Lar
na hEireann". The stated aim of the event was "to restore to it's rightful place
the traditional music of Ireland" by bringing to the midland town "the cream of
traditional musicians from the four corners of Ireland".
Some months later, from this beginning, Cumann
Ceoltoiri na hEireann (later to become Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann) was formed with the
commitment to "the musicians themselves, organising, on an annual basis, a Fleadh or
Festival of Irish music, on a national scale. From this beginning, branches of CCE sprung
up all over Ireland (Enniscorthy 1958) and soon after, in Britain and North America.
The first Fleadh Cheoil na hEireann attracted only
a few hundred hardened but enthusiastic patrons. Within five years, this annual
gathering had grown to a national festival attracting many tens of thousands of visitors.
Nowadays, the Fleadh is a major international festival drawing visitors from all five
continents. With the growth in popularity of "World Music " and the
phenomenal interest globally in Irish culture the amount of visitors from abroad coming to
Fleadhanna is increasing exponentially each year.
At the heart of the Fleadh are competitions around
which all other events revolve. To advance to these, competitors must firstly come through
County and Provincial series with qualifying provinces being the four provinces of Ireland
plus Britain, North America and other regions of the world who can also qualify.
In all, there are almost 150 competitions covering
soloists and groups, in music, song dance, - and in such varied disciplines as fiddle,
slow airs and Pipe Bands. The venues required for the competitions will need to
accommodate audiences of 50 up to 1, 500 indoor and up to 12, 000 outdoor for Marching
Bands. Considering that in terms of competitions alone the Fleadh attracts over 3, 000
qualifiers, the scale of the Fleadh can begin to be appreciated. So successful is the
Event in terms of visitors that it is the policy of CCE's Ard Comhairle not to promote the
Fleadh aggressively because if done the belief is there is not a Town in Ireland that
could host it.
