Cape Clear storytelling festival moves online for this weekend's event 

Founded in the early 1990s by a visiting American, the event is now ranked among the world's top storytelling events 

Diarmuid O'Drisceoil during a previous Cape Clear  International Story Telling Festival. Picture: Clare Keogh

The ferries filled to capacity, every bed taken, restaurant and pubs busy all day – it won’t be like that this weekend on Cape Clear.

The island’s international storytelling festival, held annually during the first weekend of September since 1994, is going virtual due to Covid-19.

“We never recorded it before. We always believed in the old-style acoustic, analogue festival – ‘if you want it, you have to be there’,” says Diarmuid Ó Drisceoil., who has been involved with the festival since it launched in the early ‘90s.

“It took outsiders to point us to something intrinsic in Irish culture – and that’s storytelling,” says

Ó Drisceoil. He’s talking about Chuck and Nell Kruger, who founded the festival after re-locating to Cape Clear from Zurich, where they’d both been teachers. 

“In Switzerland, Chuck had invited American storyteller Joel Ben Izzy to do a performance [for his students]. It captivated Chuck, stayed in his head. On Cape Clear, he wanted to help grow storytelling, make a contribution to the island – keep going a tradition that had been dying out in Ireland.” 

Within a few years, the festival had an international reputation. It now ranks in the top three storytelling festivals in the world. “Each year, we invite four featured storytellers – one each from Ireland, the UK and the US plus a teller from Europe, Africa or the Middle-East. 

The idea isn’t just to showcase the Irish storyteller, but to give people a flavour of storytelling globally – that’s the festival’s success.

 The ferries generally carry 600 people to Cape Clear on the festival weekend. Added to the native population of over 100, the island’s population more than quadruples over the three days. 

“We could treble the audience if we had the space,” saysÓ Drisceoil. He sees the festival’s attraction as also its disadvantage. “It’s small, intimate. That’s the attraction, but also the disadvantage – many more people want to come than can be accommodated.” 

Earlier this year, as March became April, the festival committee worried about feasibility of holding this year’s event. “Like many other festivals, we were putting off a decision. We had to call it in May – people would’ve been booking flights, accommodation.” 

With Arts Council funding – and this year’s four storytellers already signed up – it was decided to move Cape Clear International Storytelling Festival online. 

The committee teamed up with Wombat Media – run by West Cork native Ciara Buckley and her Australian partner David Slowo – to create an online version of the festival. Wombat Media has already produced online versions of local festivals: Taste of West Cork, Baltimore Fiddle Fair, West Cork Music Festival.

“The islanders are very disappointed at cancelling it,” says Diarmuid. 

The festival gives a huge economic injection to the island. It’s part of the yearly landscape, a key point in the calendar – like the full stop marking the end of the tourist season. Once the festival’s over, the winter season hits Cape.

Festival director Daphne Babington says it’ll be interesting to see how the screen can bring across the magic of storytelling. When festival-goers are asked what they enjoy most about the event, they most commonly say ‘we love the place’, comments Ó Drisceoil. 

“That’s what grips people. Because when they get off the boat, they’re immediately at the festival. The island’s small, only three miles long, population 110. Everyone you see and meet’s at the festival. And when an event’s over, everybody’s still there – you don’t get into your car and go somewhere else.” 

At the Saturday night concert – traditionally the biggest festival event – 275 people pack into the hall. “It’s all very acoustic – no enhanced sound. When the teller comes on stage, you can hear a pin drop. The audience feeds off it, and the energy goes up to the stage and back down.” 

This year’s virtual festival will keep the pot boiling, keep the interest. “We’ll reach a much bigger audience. We’ll reach hundreds of thousands this time,” says Diarmuid.

Cape Clear International Storytelling Festival, free and accessible to all world-wide (five separate one-hour shows), will be streamed live from September 4 to 6, through https://capeclearstorytelling.com/.

Highlights:

• Friday, September 4, 7pm, ‘Hear All The Tellers’, with Clare Muireann Murphy (Ireland), Len Cabral (USA), Mara Menzies (Kenya/Scotland), Hjörleifur Stefánsson (Iceland), and singers Ger Wolfe and Con O Drisceoil.
• Saturday, September 5, 7pm, ‘The Saturday Evening Concert’, same tellers and performers.
• Sunday, September 6, 7pm, ‘The Grand Finale’, same tellers/performers. These three concerts follow same format but feature different material; all undercut with views of Cape/the sea.
• Saturday, September 5, 12 noon, Ceiliúradh, Irish-language event (storytelling/song/folklore), with Diarmuid O Drisceoil, Paddy O’Brien, Pat Speight, Con O Drisceoil, Ger Wolfe.
• Sunday, September 6, 12 noon, ‘Children’s Stories’, with the four featured storytellers, Liz Weir and Paddy O’Brien.