Mother Of All The Festivals

There is an opinion widely held in this country that only now, a decade after our European neighbours, is Ireland going through the 1980s. If true, then the notion that we defer our celebrations of the new millennium for another 10 years might also have some justification. After all, unlike most other countries, the Irish Government has only belatedly begun putting in place structures and organisations to mark the year 2000. Because of this tardy start, there will be no equivalent here of the Millennium Dome now being built on the banks of the Thames in London. The only near approximation to this - a millennium countdown clock in the Liffey - soon proved to be a damp squib and had to be removed. While elsewhere around the world plans for events and buildings to mark the millennium surged ahead, nothing seemed to be offered here.

Finally, last March, the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Recreation, Jim McDaid, set up a body called Millennium Festivals, which was given as its objective the celebration of 2000 - during the previous year. And this week it is announcing the appointment of its general manager, Doireann Ni Bhriain, to oversee the work of, basically, bolstering up to six of the country's leading festivals next year.

Millennium Festivals can be seen as a belated attempt to do something, anything, to acknowledge what will be much more lavishly marked elsewhere. Equally, the Millennium Festivals undertaking could be described as a pragmatic response to 2000, an approaching date which has so far failed to capture public interest in any substantial fashion. There are, after all, as many critics as advocates of London's Millennium Dome, whose budget continues to escalate - some estimates putting it at more than £800 million. Millennium Festivals, on the other hand, will have a certain sum of money - as yet unknown - and a clear objective: the marking of 2000 by a promotion of Ireland as a centre of celebration in all its forms. Whatever form the Millennium Festivals programme takes, and many details have yet to be confirmed, ebut in early 1999 rapidly approaches, the organisation's newly-appointed general manager Doireann Ni Bhriain is confident that the year will leave a strong legacy behind.

She is perfectly aware of previous undertakings in this field; after all, Dublin celebrated both a millennium in 1988 and a year as European City of Culture in 1991 and yet traces of either are now hard to find. But Ni Bhriain has been here before and knows the risks. In 1996, she was Irish Commissioner of a year-long celebration of Irish culture in France, L'Imaginaire Irlandais, established at the instigation of then-Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, Michael D. Higgins. Ni Bhriain argues that L'Imaginaire achieved its aim of leaving a permanent mark in France on perceptions of Irish culture. "On the ground in France, more people now know what's going on in contemporary Irish art practice. It's seen in work now being shown by Irish visual artists, books by Irish writers in translation or their plays being performed. Artists from right across the disciplines made contacts they're still maintaining." One advantage Ni Bhriain enjoyed in her previous position was a three-year lead-in period. This time, she takes up an appointment barely four months before 1999 and the work of the Millennium Festivals is due to begin. She recognises the time-frame is tight and also that many decisions have had to be taken before she became involved. Not the least of these is the nature of Millennium Festivals's aspirations, together with the form they will take. The year's character can be effectively gauged from the membership of the organisation's board and the interests they represent.

Minister McDaid appointed the former chief executive of Aer Rianta, Derek Keogh, as chairman of Millennium Festivals Ltd. The cultural stratum is occupied by Arts Council director Patricia Quinn and the Gate Theatre's Michael Colgan, while tourism dominates the remaining places on the board thanks to the presence of Bord Failte's Paul O'Toole and incoming director general John Dully, plus John Power of the Irish Hotels Federation, tourism operator Eileen O'Mara Walsh and Aer Lingus's Dan Loughrey.

The slogan chosen by this group - The Party Starts Here - also helps to define Millennium Festivals's nature. According to a statement from Keogh: "This is an opportunity for Irish people and visitors to start the millennium party early. At the same time, we will be making a tangible contribution to the growth and survival of Irish festivals."

So, having begun preparations for the year 2000 relatively late, Ireland will now begin acknowledging the date before everyone else. The celebratory form being taken is, in effect, a piggy-backing on existing structures, specifically festivals. Ni Bhriain admits as much when she says "the feeling the board had when they started was `look, we don't have the funds, or the time, to do anything like the dome in London'. What are we good at? Enjoying ourselves. So, that kind of thinking led on to celebrations and festivals. There's a line of thought development which can be traced back."

Once a decision had been taken to use existing festivals as the millennial springboard, organisations involved in this field throughout the country were invited to submit proposals for participation and a small number duly chosen. These are the St Patrick's Festival in Dublin - which will officially open Ireland's millennium celebrations - Kilkenny Arts Festival in August, Wexford Festival Opera in October and the Belfast Festival at Queen's in November. Discussions are ongoing with Galway Arts Festival and Cork Jazz Festival. Two thoughts strike when looking at this list: that the festivals chosen are the country's best-known and most successful and, therefore, least in need of additional help and resources, and that arts festivals are favoured to the exclusion of all others. While admitting the truth of both these arguments, Ni Bhriain has her responses well martialled.

With regard to the support being given to events with the best track record, she says: "Well, we weren't set up primarily to help festivals. As I see it, we have a three-fold mission, each of the three elements being of equal importance. The first of these is to be a coming-up-to-the-millennium celebration. It goes through the festivals during the year and we don't do anything on December 31st. Secondly, we're here to help build and develop Irish festivals in general. The lion's share of support will go to these top festivals because they're the ones we'll be using to help everyone which is the third element - we want to bring more visitors to Ireland to attend these and other festivals."

Ni Bhriain argues with conviction that the groups chosen by Millennium Festivals will be expected to justify their selection. "We have to be absolutely sure that the goods will be delivered at their end," she says. However, lest there be too much disappointment at the idea of rejection letters being received around Ireland, she adds: "We would hope in 1999 to work in a lower developmental level with a handful of other festivals whose submissions and ways of operating impressed the board." Which other festivals these might be, she will not divulge. As for the preponderance of arts festivals, she remarks: "We didn't set out to be specifically cultural - the festival didn't have to have that character to submit to the board. It's interesting the cultural ones rose to the top among those which applied but it's not surprising because I think they're probably the best." In line with her board's interweaving of culture and tourism, she is keen to promote the idea of Ireland participating more fully in the European arts festival circuit.

"There is a large market of people in Europe who want festivals and plan holidays around them. At the moment, Ireland's not really on that map and we should be in the future. We may not do it in the same way as some of the older European ones like Salzburg or Avignon, but we should be striving to make the content of our festivals the kind of thing people would travel here for. Figures show a high percentage of visitors to Ireland come because of our culture and heritage. It seems only right to point them towards one of the current manifestations of these. It also happens to allow us to have a celebratory element throughout the year. There's a serendipitous coming-together of various people's aims."

That includes Ni Bhriain's own; she admits that had cultural events not been to the forefront, she would probably not have applied for her new job nor been offered the position - "I certainly wouldn't have leapt at it with quite such enthusiasm". Enthusiasm will be needed over the coming months, because while aspirations are now in place, not much else is yet. A budget, for example, has still to be agreed. Understandably, Ni Bhriain is cautious to speak on the subject. During the present year, Millennium Festivals was given £500,000 by the Government "to get the project up and running". From this sum, she says "very small amounts have been given to make a token contribution to festivals with which we're working next year, just to begin the relationship".

As yet, however, there is no definite word on 1999's budget, neither its size nor date of availability. "It will come from the Government," insists Ni Bhriain, although she is obliged to confess "how exactly we don't know. The board of Millennium Festivals is confident it will get what it needs." Personally, she says she would like "a fistful of millions. To do it right, we need that." Obviously, a lot of planning is contingent on knowing what money will be provided. But Ni Bhriain is firm; "we have great faith they [the government] will know a good project when they see one, and Minister McDaid is very committed." For the moment, decision-making of whatever kind is aided by the presence of Bord Failte - "and we hope Northern Ireland Tourism as well" - in the Millennium Festivals' preparations. The Overseas Tourism Marketing Initiative is also involved. "The OTMI has a very good marketing strategy and has allowed us to work with them, so we're not starting on our own."

Partly because of this uncertainty over funding and partly thanks to her new arrival in the job, she is just as loath to discuss the specific details of what form next year's celebrations will take. "I can't do that yet. I don't want to start laying down what the festivals will be doing until they've all got together and worked out what to do. It'll be something big, something celebratory and giving the sense of everyone having a party. Bigger, better, newer and particularly appealing; it would be rash of me to go beyond that. The start of any project is 80 per cent aspiration." So far, therefore, the only clear aspiration is to use 1999 to develop key festivals in Ireland and thereby encourage related tourist growth. The millennial element begins to look distinctly secondary and Ni Bhriain has the grace to accept that a date on the calendar is being conveniently used - "but we're also celebrating it". Returning to the topic of the events selected for participation in the Millennium Festivals's programme, she comments "they were chosen because they are established, varied in size, have track records and we can be pretty sure will continue on after we've left." The last item on that list is perhaps the most important.

If Ni Bhriain and her board are successful - and given the considerable uncertainty about budgets and hence programming which now exist, that is a very big qualifier - then 1999 will have an impressive long-term legacy. Otherwise, it will take its place alongside previous events such as the Dublin Millennium which have left almost no traces. Ni Bhriain's hope, and that of her board, is that next year not only will Ireland begin its millennial party before everyone else, but also we will have something to celebrate long after the year 2000 has passed.