The Arts: The Junction Festival is updating Eamon de Valera's image of Ireland with an eclectic mix of theatre and music from around the world. Siobhán Long reports

The country might be falling down with summer festivals, sessions, knees-ups and general mayhem, but the pie isn't always sliced equally. While Cork shifts in to top gear in preparation for its European Capital of Culture duties, and Dublin considers it its birthright to enjoy countless festivals, the west braces itself for Galway Arts Festival, and smaller towns and townlands from Ballaghaderreen to Miltown Malbay bask in the warm glow of the summer school.

Clonmel, in Co Tipperary, has only recently jumped on the festival bandwagon, channelling its creative juices into the Junction Festival, now in its fourth year. Having cut its teeth with programmes that opened their arms to artists from as far afield as Ivory Coast and Bulgaria, this year the festival is setting its sights even higher, intent on doubling not only its gate receipts but also its place in the hearts and minds of locals and visitors alike.

David Teevan, the festival's director, oozes the enthusiasm of a man who has found his calling. With years of involvement in theatre, most recently as manager of Galloglass, he set up the Junction Festival to attract touring companies that normally bypass the town. Unperturbed by the absence of even an arts officer in the county, Teevan set about creating the festival in the organic way that anyone without a decent budget is forced to do.

"Clonmel doesn't have a year-round programmed theatre," Teevan explains. "Unlike a lot of other towns of similar size around the country, Clonmel failed to take advantage of the funding in the late 1990s and build a municipal theatre. As I was involved with my partner, Theresia Guschlbauer, in Galloglass, we felt that it would be of benefit to us as theatre promoters to bring other theatre in to town. We have a thriving arts community here and a beautiful town, so we said why not bring those two things together in a great way?"

Kicking off with Donal O'Kelly's famed Catalpa, back in 2001, the Junction Festival has since been forging its reputation on a wily and eclectic mix of theatre and music, with its sights set on a world stage. Its name reflects its ambition to be an event that crosses borders, straddles boundaries and fuses rather than sunders various genres of music and theatre.

"Clonmel is a kind of a crossroads," he says, "and we wanted to update that old de Valerian image of dancing at the crossroads, so we came up with the idea of a junction, which conjures images of a superhighway. The theme of the festival has been this idea of encountering or meeting. We've taken to inviting performers and troupes not just for one day but for two, three or four days, creating opportunities for workshops which extend their visits and allow us and them the time for an encounter that can go beyond the performance."

Necessity is indeed the mother of invention, with Clonmel compensating for its lack of a modern theatre with a choice of venues that would put the most creative of festival directors to shame. "For a festival you can create an environment for a show," Teevan says. "You can have theatre in the street, in a yard or a garden. You can create spaces especially for a show, and each year we're getting more ambitious in this regard. This year we have a production of Romeo And Juliet in the courtyard of a hotel, and we're staging a production of Typhoid Mary in a local restaurant."

Musically, the festival's embrace is equally wide, stretching from rock to jazz and world music, including the Ivory Coast band Yelemba d'Abidjan. Teevan believes that with the Berlin-based Bulgarian quintet Di Grine Kuzine (or my culchie cousin, as he translates it) and the Indian sitarist Shubhendra Rao, not to mention everyone from Mundy to Damien Dempsey in between, only outright party poopers will find themselves idle.

Rao's bags are already packed. A disciple and long-time student of Ravi Shankar, he will be playing alongside his wife, the cellist Saskia Rao-De Haas, and the tabla player Shahbaz Hussain. "Saskia has adapted the cello for Indian classical music," he explains. "She has really transcended barriers by modifying the instrument completely yet retaining the original beauty of the cello. She's Indianised it by adding more strings to it - it's a 15-string cello right now - and she sits on the floor like all other Indian musicians.

"One of the influences we use is European and Indian folk music, and the Irish tradition is also a very rich folk tradition. It's very different to Indian music, but I believe that folk music is the one music where we can build bridges, unlike Western classical or jazz."

During a brief tour of Ireland a few years ago Rao forged links with Alec Finn of De Danann, with whom he plans to play again this year. "I like the idea that the Junction Festival has: that musicians from different regions can just meet and mingle and work together. Who knows what might come through? We had such a good feeling playing with Alec and with the great fiddler Charlie Lennon.

"What we have planned for our concert is that we first play solo, accompanied by the tabla. Saskia will start with a solo of pure Indian classical music, I will follow that up with a sitar solo and then we will play together. We love to compose using different influences, whether it's folk traditions or contemporary influences. For example, we've composed a piece after September 11th, which is very powerful, an expression of our feelings."

Rao is quick to acknowledge the debt he owes to Shankar. "He's my mentor, my guide, my idol," he says. "I've been fortunate to be with him since early childhood. The relationship of the guru and the disciple never ends. Irrespective of what I achieve in my life he's always there for guidance, if needed. The relationship is a very beautiful one; it's more than that of a teacher or even of a father. It's a very spiritual relationship. I've been very fortunate to be under him."

The singer Alexandra Dimitroff is the founder of Di Grine Kuzine. She plans to bring something entirely different to the festival. "Our music is based on east and south European music," she says. "We started out as a klezmer band and then realised that klezmer music is very influenced by east European tunes, because Jewish musicians were travelling all around Europe. As a Berlin band we have close contact with the Slavic culture, and my father comes from Bulgaria, so it was just a small step to cross over with east European music."

Di Grine Kuzine are preparing themselves for the challenge of playing a mix of venues in Clonmel. Armed with trumpet, clarinet, soprano saxophone, drums, tuba and accordion, they make no apologies for stretching both eardrums and musical sensibilities.

"None of us have ever been to Ireland before, so this is a good excuse for us to visit," she laughs. "We've learned that we can never anticipate how people will respond to our music. A German band playing east European music might be strange, but we have our own style and we're very honest in what we do. It's a personal touch which seems to work well with our audiences."

• The Junction Festival opens in Clonmel on Saturday, running until July 11th. More details from www.junctionfestival.com or 052-29339