Music Festival is ‘up and running’

With the very successful Irish Dancing competitions finishing on Saturday, this week it is the turn of the instrumental events.

Festival highlights this year include the Junior Instrumentalist and Open Strings Solos on Wednesday 20 February; the Open Strings event, including the Festival Award for String Playing on Thursday 21 February; and the Open Woodwind and the Credit Union Awards for Woodwind on Friday 22 February.

The Instrumental Festival Night will be held on Saturday 23 February at 7pm.

Vocal highlights include: the Northern Ireland Singer Award on Wednesday 27 February; Male Voice Repertoire and the Grand Opera and Light Opera competitions on Friday 1 March.

The Final Gala Night and Prize-giving, which includes the Montgomery’s Young Voice Award, the Adair Arms Award for Female Voice and the Stevenson Award for Overall Voice Championship, takes place on Saturday 2 March at 7pm.

There will be demonstrations by the dance, music, speech and traditional music sections on the night.

As ever, members of the public are invited to attend these popular events, paying at the door. Festival programmes will be available from the Braid Arts Centre. A timetable of Festival events and other information is available on the Festival website: www.ballymenafestival.org.uk