Joe and Steve Wall were at the launch of the Galway Arts Festival music programme. MMMmmmm. This was the fourth and final warm-up party before the festival begins on Tuesday, July 18th. Who else was there? Oh, em . . . well, the Walls were there. Their new album, Hi- Lo, has just been released and they'll be playing in the Warwick Hotel (the scene of their last performance before they disbanded as The Stunning) on Tuesday, July 25th, as part of the festival.
Others? Well, others at the party, which offered us caviar and pineapple with cheese, olives, chicken, bread and Guinness, included Mary Murray, who plays Sorrell in On Raftery's Hill, who was getting ready to travel this week with the cast to perform over the next month in London's Royal Court Theatre.
Flown over especially for the party were Marina Escoda, Noelia Garcia and Montse Sanchez, flamenco and contemporary dancers from Barcelona, who will perform in the festival in an Irish premiere of a show called Oidos de Lorca - Lorca's Ears.
Actor Tim Ruddy, from Belmullet in Co Mayo, was there chatting to some well-known faces from TV's Fair City - namely Claudia Carroll and Waterford man Seamus Power. Acting-couple Marie Mullen and Sean McGinley came along with their children, Roisin (6) and Mairead (2).
Fergal McGrath, festival manager, who worked with cut flowers for seven years before changing from a career in agricultural science to a life in festival-land, says working with Rose Parkinson, the festival's new artistic director, is "something else". "She's got vision . . . she's got attitude and vision." Hate that.