I have long thought about starting a Celtic festival. Andrew McKee and I talked about it quite a few times when we started the Brobdingnagian Bards. It's a great way to get a gig and help your fellow musicians. If you do it right. That was one of the sticking points–doing it right.

It's a lot of work to start and run a festival. Ultimately, that's NOT what I want do with my time. I have no desire to start another North Texas Irish Festival or Texas Scottish Festival. But could I do something simpler.

I was struck with an interesting twist while listening to Seth Godin's Akimbo podcast. Instead of creating some giant festival, why not create a mini-fest that could be linked to the Irish & Celtic Music Podcast and that could help out some local Celtic musicians. There was the first problem with this budding idea, finding local Celtic musicians.

I live in Atlanta, Georgia right now. A lot of Irish and Scottish immigrants settled in Georgia. I'll be honest, I expected there to be a large thriving, Celtic community here. Even before the pandemic, I was a bit disappointed.

Yes. There are some Atlanta Celtic musicians (I made a list). But that list feels a lot smaller than one would expect in such a large city. So either, the artists aren't here, or they aren't actively connecting and trying to build a community. I guess they could be quietly building their community at Irish sessions but not taking it to the next level. I don't know.

I'm pretty terrible about building community. I graduated college as a cultural geographer. Yet I prefer being out on the fringe of most communities. But using my web skills, I have long been a promoter of Celtic culture through music.

Now I'm looking into the idea of doing that. And it seems the best way to start is to start small–something like the Irish & Celtic Music Mini-PodFest.

Right now, this is just an idea. But I would love more thoughts on the topic. Would you be interested in attending? Would you be interested in helping make it happen?

Drop me a line.

PS. I just released a single of “Peggy Gordon”. It was originally released on The Bridge. Stream now on Spotify, Amazon Music, or Apple Music.