WITHIN days of the opening of the 34th Belfast Festival at Queen's on November 4th, reports began to emerge of slow box office bookings, with unfavourable comparisons being made with the euphoria of last year's post ceasefire event, writes Jane Coyle. In face, there were many good shows in the programme even amongst the over hasty first week criticism, there was warm praise - though shamefully sparse audiences - for the superb opening concert by the Belgian chamber orchestra I Fiamminghi and the thrilling What the Body Does Not Remember by the Belgian dance company Ultima Vez. Other shows attracted the public endorsement of rapturous approval and full houses Slava Polunin's Snowshow, which prompted similar gasps of admiration as it did at the Dublin Theatre Festival; Macnas's spectacular Balor; the one man shows of Owen O'Neill and Ardal O'Hanlon and the Slava Polinin in mighty singing of Angela Snowshow, a hit in Belfast Browne at the Guinness Spot, as in Dublin, to name but a few.

What was missing were visible signs of the festival on the street, even in the university area, let alone significant evidence of ownership by those further flung Belfast communities, whose future access and involvement will be among new festival director Sean Doran's top priorities.