THE KILKENNY Arts Festival outlined an excellent programme for this year yesterday and came up with an innovative way to launch it.
In the sunshine at Dublin Corporation fruit markets, a choir belted out the full programme in just four minutes.
The singers came from the new Kilkenny Festival Choir, an amateur ensemble who will spearhead a focus on choral music that will culminate in a performance in St Canice’s Cathedral.
Quirkier elements of this year’s festival, which takes place from August 6th-15th, will include two theatre shows that will each feature only one performer and a single audience member.
In The Smile Off Your Face,the punter will be blindfolded and in a wheelchair throughout. In a less tense affair, Foot Washing for the Solewill see artist Adrian Howells washing each person's feet.
Musical highlights will include a double-bill of Calcutta slide guitar followed by a Malian kora player, while the rock programme features indie fixtures Tindersticks and Belfast band And So I Watch You Afar, whose live shows have been attracting increasing attention.
Elsewhere, there will be a retrospective of Gabriel Byrne films and archive footage of the GAA in Hollywood. Literary highlights will include John Banville, Paul Durcan and acclaimed US novelist David Vann.
Among the featured visual artists will be Turner Prize nominees Susan Philipsz and Willie Doherty.