Irish Festival Promoters Conference

Hi, I’m back. Did you miss me? Thank you Shocko, for covering the blog so well.

KCIF executive director Keli O’Neill Wenzel, directors Ed Follis, Patti Aylward and myself had a great and very informative time in Pittsburgh. Before I do anything else, on behalf of the four of us I want to send a huge thank you to Nan Krushinski and all out hosts in their beautiful city. They put on an amazing conference, and the hospitality was unbelievable, and very much appreciated. I would encourage anybody who can to get out to Pittsburgh for their Irish Festival right after our own in September. If it’s organized half as well as this conference was, then it would be a great time indeed.

Along with the Kansas City crowd, representatives from festivals in St. Louis, Minnesota, Indianapolis, Louisville, Michigan, Dallas, Dublin (Ohio), Southern Illinois, Bethlehem (Pennsylvania), Milwaukee, Virginia, Cleveland, New York, and Manhattan (Illinois) were there, as well as Colm Croffy from the Association of Irish Festival Events (AOIFE) in Ballinasloe, Co. Galway, Paul Keating from The Catskills Irish Arts Week, and Brain Doherty from Eastern Entertainment Agency in Halifax, Nova Scotia. We attended discussions, workshops and lectures covering sponsorship, entertainment, marketing, ticketing, childrens areas, transportation, summer schools, and several other topics. Just as informative and helpful, we had numerous casual conversations with our counterparts from the other events, some larger, some smaller, most more experienced. That kind of shared experience and camaraderie is what makes this event invaluable. I think we’ve all developed long term friendships that will help the Kansas City Irish as we grow and improve. This informal (for now) association of American Irish festivals will be an incredibly helpful tool for all us in the years to come. We extended invitations to all of them to join us here in Cowtown in September and sincerely hope they take us up on it.

I don’t want to give the impression that the weekend was all work and no play. I don’t think you’d believe me if I did! You put 40 or 50 people who essentially are in the business of throwing big parties together for a weekend, and it's a good bet some frivolity will break out. We were treated on both nights to fantastic food, copious pints, an amazing amount of great music and very little sleep. By my count we saw 8 or 9 on stage performances over the 2 nights (and a Saturday night session that raged until 5:00 Sunday morning), and I guarantee you’ll be seeing some these acts here at future festivals. A few of my personal favorites from the weekend: Vishten, Glengarry Bhoys, Johnny Connolly, Kevin Burke and Ged Foley.

There’s too much info about the conference to relate all of it here, but if you have any specific questions about the conference, let me know.

And if you see Patti, be sure to ask her about her new wardrobe and Keli about her new dental work.