Macnas's colourful parade brings people out on the streets to join in the celebrations as this year's Galway Arts Festival gets into full swing in the city, writes Deridre Falvey.
THERE'S A VAST four-peaked blue tent looming out of the skyline beside Galway cathedral. Large insect-cum-robot creatures roam the streets, and there's a surfeit of drumming groups dotted along the main streets of the city. People are rowing (um, debating) in pubs about the merits of various shows. Unbelievably, the sun has come out at last. Galway Arts Festival is in full swing.
Macnas's festival parade, on the middle Sunday of the festival, was a night-time affair this year, starting at 10pm, as dusk fell in the West. While the late timing could have kept some people away, the crowds seemed as large as ever, and any disadvantage was more than compensated for by the magic and atmosphere in the dark. More than 60,000 people watched the parade, which took a different, and longer, route, ending with fireworks set off at the Black Box. The title was Apocolopolis, the city that doesn't sleep, and the early part of what was a very substantial and impressive parade depicted a non-stop party, lead by a lone piper on high and followed by all sorts, including "Fit Nurses" and "Pimp Surgeons" with a hospital trolley, administering large injections (including to the crowd), party girls and manic disco dancers. Festival director Paul Fahy always figures somewhere in the parade, and, would you credit it, there he was, delighted to be playing King.
White and yellow dominated costumes early on, with suble uplighting on floats creating a spectral sort of glow without any pyrotechnics. This gave way to a darker, sometimes more threatening tone, reflected in the costumes, and the pulsating city theme was followed by an ominous circus, with sinister "Clownmandos" creating mayhem and ruin. The mess was later cleaned up by "Janitor Stilters" and "Dust Devils". At least I think this was what was going on - in many ways the detail of the narrative doesn't matter as much as the spectacle and magic.
And standing at the bottom of Eglinton Street, with the full length of the street in view, that magic started with the sight in the distance of giant white creatures making their way slowly through the streets. Matthew Guinnane's design was striking and the parade, directed by Debbie Wright, had great coherence and vibrancy, and was more ambitious and visually arresting than last year's.
About 300 performers, including many from community groups, took part in the parade, which took well over two hours to wend its way through the city before impressive fireworks, well after midnight, said to be the most expensive seen in Galway, wound up the night.
That big top which punctures the skyline is the festival's own - this is the first use for the large tent commissioned by the festival a few years ago, and is getting regular usage through the fortnight, with the Australian Circa performing there all last week, as well as the bigger musical events. The Preservation Hall Jazz Band in the big top was exactly what it said on the . . . big bass drum. A tight ensemble with a traditional jazz sound, they got the big top going, threading their way through the audience, many of whom they invited onstage with them, who ended the night dancing with the band, with varied skill and always general gusto. Passionate Cuban diva Omara Portundo, who went global on foot of the Buena Vista Social Club, also had people on their feet in the big top. Her expressive voice is still in great fettle, and her energy levels are amazing: could she really be over 80?
LOTS OF SHOWS continue this week, including the endearing and gently humorous Waiting for Elvisby Eileen Gibbons, and three strong shows from the always dependable Galway Youth Theatre. There's was a buzz about in anticipation of Better Late, starring Frazier regular and friend of Galway John Mahoney, and also about Blondie playing on Thursday night in the big top. And the darkly funny and striking dance/physical theatre show Giselle, the first piece (and best, I reckon) of Michael Keegan Dolan and Fabulous Beast's trilogy, has five performances in Galway from tomorrow. First seen in Dublin some years ago, it's been over the world to great acclaim ever since.
But back to this weekend, and Christina Lamb, articulate, cool and gently humorous, spoke on Saturday afternoon about her years of working as a foreign correspondent in conflict zones. Twenty years ago as a naive 20 year old she went, off-her-own-bat, to Pakistan, from where she made regular forays into Afghanistan. She later became personal friends with Benazir Bhutto and went to her wedding. She was disillusioned at the lack of reform and the corruption that followed Bhutto's electoral victories, and wrote about it. It took a long time for their friendship to recover, but later Lamb was on Bhutto's campaign bus when it was first bombed 10 weeks before the fatal attack. She also talked about Zimbabwe, and the advantages and disadvantages of being embedded with British troops in Iraq. The Q&A session was illuminating, pointing up how, for all the good it does, the International Criminal Court also makes it impossible to get rid of dictators, as they now know they cannot safely leave their countries.
Despite two decades of witnessing harrowing scenes and inhuman behaviour, Christina Lamb is still idealistic, and still amazed by the ability of the human spirit to transcend it all, and get on with feeding, clothing and educating their children. "How people keep going in that situation gives you hope." She ended by talking about Mugabe berating his people for voting incorrectly. And how she was reminded of it this weekend when she read about Sarkozy's visit in the Irish papers.
• Galway Arts Festival continues until Sunday.
