Connaire says town should use fleadh as springboard for new St Patrick's Day parade

Mullingar should use its fleadh experience to give itself something it has long lacked: a top-class St Patrick’s Day parade.

That’s the view of Fleadh committee chairman Joe Connaire – and "yes", he says, he’d be more than delighted to get involved.

"I look at Mullingar on St Patrick's Day and the town is dead, and it shouldn’t be," says Joe.

The fleadh has demonstrated clearly that it doesn’t have to be that way:

"I don't think there'll be too many people in Mullingar who wouldn’t have been delighted at what went on," he says of the eight-day fleadh.

While naturally he is not talking of a Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann-scale event, he believes the fleadh journey leaves the town well-poised to come up with an event that would impress on St Patrick’s Day.

"St Patrick's Day is a big calendar date in our lives in Ireland and for a town the size of Mullingar, there should be a great parade.

"I’ll put it this way: when you see the likes of Tyrrellspass and Castlepollard – villages - doing a huge effort…I was in Castlepollard last year and it was just amazing, so maybe the fleadh might be a bit of a wake-up call for the people here to do something like that." As far as Joe’s aware there isn’t anything in the pipeline, but it is definitely time, he believes, for the town to up its game and if anyone does set the ball rolling, he would definitely, he says, be prepared to give a hand out: "There’s no issue there."

Meanwhile, Comhaltas in Westmeath is anticipating a surge in demand for music lessons now that so many people locally have witnessed so many talented traditional performers in action.

"When Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann was in Cavan for a couple of years, there was a huge uptake in the amount of people that wanted to learn traditional music," says Joe.

The organisation already runs an extensive programme of classes in Westmeath: "There's music lessons going on in every branch and there are seven branches in the county. They all have music lessons from September to May – more or less school terms.

"If anyone wants to get involved they should contact me, or any of the branches or our Comhaltas secretary Colette Glynn and we will point you in the right direction."

The numbers involved are already impressive: as many as 140 receive musical training on a weekly basis in Ballynacargy, and all trad instruments are catered for – banjos, fiddles, mandolins, guitars, whistles, flutes, accordions, drums and bodhráns.