Stendhal Festival recently hosted a socially-distant gig at Ballymully Cottage Farm, Limavady in Northern Ireland with 250 guests, but the festival went bigger this weekend just gone by hosting a proper music festival with 2000 visitors and 60 music acts playing live across a weekend.
Stendhal operated a 20% capacity this year compared to 2019’s pre-pandemic edition.
It was the first such festival event on the island of Ireland, with social distancing and reduced capacity, along with COVID safety measures like mask wearing suggested but no mandatory outside but mandatory inside.
Acts who played include And So I Watch You From Afar, Beauty Sleep, Cherym, Sasha Samara, New Pagans, Beoga, Lyra, Kila, Ciaran Lavery, ROE, Joshua Burnside, Jealous Of The Birds, General Fiasco and more.
A second Stendhal weekend is planned for August 12th to 14th for a planned capacity of 5000 people.
Check out the photos by Ciara McMullan.
“We’ve had some amazing events on this farm going back to 2011,” he said, “but this one will always stand out and will always probably be our most important event ever.”
“When I heard that first guitar ring through the air on Friday afternoon I got goose bumps. It was so amazing to actually be back and putting on a show.
“I know it was really special for the performers too, they have waited a long time to have the opportunity to get back to doing what they do best and you could see it in their faces and hear it in their performances that this really was a special moment for them.”
“It was a massive effort from everyone this past week to not only get the site built but to run the event on just a weeks notice. We have an amazing team up here but they really did go above and beyond this year and everyone should be incredibly proud of what we have achieved here,”
Festival Director Ross Parkhill
Stendhal Festival was enabled by funding from Causeway Coast and Glens Borough Council.
Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-influential Irish music site Nialler9, where he has been writing about music since 2005 . He is the co-host of the Nialler9 Podcast and has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Cara Magazine, Sunday Times, Totally Dublin, Red Bull and more. Niall is a DJ, founder of Lumo Club, club promoter, event curator and producer of gigs, listening parties & events in Dublin.
