County Clare Fleadh Cheoil 16-20 June 2011
For the third successive year, the Co. Clare Fleadh Cheoil was held in Kilfenora, one of Ireland’s villages most famed for its music.

2011 is also the 60th anniversary of the Comhaltas Ceoltóirí Éireann, the traditional music society of Ireland which manages the fleadhanna.

A record number of competitors entered for a county Fleadh - 660 individual performers, 42 dancing sets and 40 bands, over 1400 entrants. The scope and standard of the Clare Fleadh surpassed all others.

 As in previous years, we hope that some of our winners willprogress through the Munster provincial competition and eventually emerge as All-Ireland champions. 

(See separate page to access the results from the 2011 Cavan Fleadh Cheoil and the Munster Fleadh. Many Clare winners are featured in the results, which you can read or download from this site.)

Alongside the competitions, other musical events included céilís with top Irish bands.

  • Open-air céilí with the fabulous Kilfenora Céilí Band (Sunday, 5-7 pm) in Kilfenora Square
  • Céilí with the Abbey Céilí Band on Friday in the hall
  • Céilí with Johnny Reidy on Saturday in the hall
  • Céilís with the Four Courts Céilí Band onThursday and Sunday, in Vaughans Barn

In addition there were sessions in the pubs daily including Monday, featuring many of Clare’s finest musicians, and also the celebrated Singers' Night  on Friday 17 June (Linnane's) - see below for a list of participants.

Finally, there was a concert, one of the Riches of Clare events staged around the county, on Friday at 1.00 pm in the magical setting of the old cathedral church. The featured musicians were Kilfenora's own Noel O' Donohue (flute - see picture on the right) and James and Anthony Devitt (fiddle and banjo), with Corofin piano maestro Padraic O'Reilly. See http://www.richesofclare.com for more details of concerts and a free promotional CD.

(A separate CD, "Live in Kilfenora" featuring banjo wizard Kevin Griffin with Eoin O'Neill and Quentin Cooper, was recorded at a previous Riches of Clare concert in 2009, and is available from Custy's Music in Ennis.)

You can get a taste of the fine weather, fantastic music sessions and Sunday's open-air céilí from both 2011 and 2010 in the pictures on these and other pages.

SINGERS NIGHT - FRIDAY IN LINNANES PUB

Among those appearing were Robbie McMahon, Declan Coyne (Roscommon Singers Circle), Mary Noonan (Shanaglish Singers Club),  Penelope Chung (Whitegate Singers Club), Donie Lyons, Sean Healy, Chris O’ Shea (West Limerick Singers Club), Carmel Gunning (Musician & Singer, Sligo), Noirin Lynch (Limerick), Members of Ennis Singers Club, Michael Falsey, Helen Hayes, Deirdre Comber, Katie Theasby (Musician & Singer), Angela Crotty, David Larkin (Galway), Michael Hackett (Dublin), and a host of local singers. There will also be a few tunes from the musicians attending.