Coolaney is a pretty, well-kept village at the foot of the Ox Mountains in Co Sligo that has won the Tidy Towns contest three times. It has four pubs, a couple of shops and an undertakers'. Few cars were passing through yesterday afternoon.
It seems an unlikely setting for a Glastonbury-style festival event, but this, on a very small scale, is what is planned this weekend at a farmhouse about two miles from the village.
Jonathan Brimble, who is English, has lived at the house for a number of years and runs a group called Spacecraft, which he describes as alternative cabaret.
"We were touring in England for the summer and we wanted to bring it to Ireland," he said.
The result is to be a weekend of alternative theatre, poetry and music in the mini-amphitheatre dug into the farmyard, and on the stage constructed in the hayshed over the past few days.
Last night was to be the theatre night, according to Jonathan, featuring a play, The Southwark Mysteries, by John Constable, who described his play to The Irish Times.
"It is a cycle of shamanic poems dictated by a medieval prostitute from Southwark, which at the time was outside the law of the City of London. It is really about a vision of the healing of the war between the flesh and the spirit, a divine vision manifested in low life."
The Pidgin Players were preparing to perform their version of Macbeth in pidgin English. Tonight there will be Irish music and dancing in the hayshed.
Mr Brimble said tickets were available in local shops and were free to anyone who donated to one of the charity boxes. Those attending would also be asked to contribute to the Chernobyl Children's Project.
In Mary O'Grady's pub in the village they were quite happy with the goings-on.
"They're not bothering anyone," she said. "They're out in the middle of nowhere. There's no concern about it in the village."
One of her customers said he believed in "live and let live".
"I wish I was young again. I'd be joining them," he added.