Stand-out events to celebrate coming of the new year

While there are many local functions being arranged, Dublin and Limerick in particular are planning big public events to celebrate the arrival of the new year.

Dún Laoghaire will have two fireworks displays, one for younger revellers and families with children at 6pm with the fireworks going from Carlisle Pier and the main display at midnight with fireworks being fired from the east and west piers at midnight.

The display can be seen from Newtowsmith in Dún Laoghaire and all around Dublin Bay.

In Waterford, party goers can enjoy the countdown to midnight in Cathedral Square and listen to church bells around the city to ring in the new year and mark the beginning of the celebrations of the 1100th anniversary of Ireland’s oldest city.

For the big event Dublin’s College Green is being illuminated in preparation for the festival, which will see a procession of light, street performers and dancers parade through the city.

The Dublin countdown concert at College Green begins at 8.30pm and tickets cost €25. Madness will headline, along with the Strypes, Ryan Sheridan and MKS (Mutya, Keisha, Siobhán). The concert, which is set to be hosted by RTÉ’s Dáithí O’Sé and Sinéad Kennedy, is expected to attract 10,000 people to the city centre, and will see Trinity College lit up by projections which will count down to the new year.

The concert draws the successful year of The Gathering to a close, which brought some 275,000 additional visitors to Ireland in 2013, and provided a windfall of €170 million for the economy.

Festival organisers are also preparing to welcome 2014 in with a family friendly “Big Brunch” in Temple Bar on the morning of New Year’s Day.

Limerick’s new year celebrations will begin with a city centre parade from 6.30pm by the theatre company Buí Bolg followed by a live storybook using digital video mapping in the Medieval Quarter and a specially composed story written by local playwright Mike Finn. Former Cranberry and Limerick native Dolores O’Riordan will be joined by the Irish Chamber Orchestra to ring in the new year at a concert in St Mary’s Cathedral.

In Cork, Mick Flannery plays Cork Opera House with tickets available from €21 to €26 from the Cork Opera House website. Singer Jack L will play the Everyman Palace in Cork at 8pm and tickets are €28.

The Shandon Bells at the church of St Anne will ring in the new year.

Met Éireann has warned however that we may be entering 2014 through a thunderstorm.