Ulster Bank festival at Queen's

Various venues, Belfast Oct 19-Nov 4 belfastfestival.com

From humble origins, as a “student bash” in 1961, the Belfast Festival at Queen’s became an arts festival with gravity while attuned to the times – Jimi Hendrix, The Moscow State Ballet, Anthony Burgess and Robert Wilson all visited.

In recent years the festival has clawed its way back from financial straits through Ulster Bank sponsorship, resisted political pressure on its programme, and, this year, seen the departure of its most recent director after less than six months (Shan McAnena is now at the reins). An institution that has weathered tension and division with the aim of delivering a shared experience, its 50th festival is no small celebration.

It may be hard to determine an overarching theme, but the theatre programme is led by a promising display of homegrown works. Director Lynne Parker brings Macbeth (left) to the Lyric, its first Shakespeare production in the new building, here fine-tuned for political and cultural resonances. Tinderbox’s musicality is furthered in Stacey Gregg’s new play Huzzies, about a young rock group fleeing grim realities, and Rosemary Jenkinson conspires with Kabosh for the site-specific haunting of Ghosts of Drumglass. Among visiting productions comes Dermot Bolger’s anticipated Ulysses adaptation for Tron Theatre, and the National Theatre of Scotland’s timely investigation of the newspaper industry, Enquirer.

All commensurate with a festival whose impact, from campus boundaries to city limits, has always reached beyond its borders.

Can't see that? Catch this:Limerick Unfringed Festival Belltable Arts Centre

PETER CRAWLEY