Tonnta Festival bears the fruits of positive reactions

The 2024 Tonnta Festival took place last week in Galway City and proved to be a huge hit. Locals gathered throughout the four days of action to soak in the best of ‘Gaeilge traditions’. 

A wave of craic in Galway

For the first edition of the festival, the organizers chose the ‘city of tribes’ to celebrate Irish traditions and language. The festival is named “Tonnta” which is the Irish word for “waves”. As a coastal county and city, Galway has always had a symbolic relationship with the sea (farraige). The festival itself marks St. Brigid’s Day and a bank holiday weekend: the beginning of Spring and rebirth.

The sound of the waves crashing against the shores of Galway Bay is reminiscent of the wave of the sound of Gaeilge among the streets of Galway for the bilingual festival. Tonnta celebrates the Irish language, and also celebrates the official bilingual status of Galway. The aim of the event is to encourage and welcome more non-Irish speakers to the language in a fun, casual, informative manner.

A variety of events

The traditional music in The Crane Bar kicked the festival off with Seisiun Mor Cheoil na mBan putting on a show in front of a packed house. The Róisín Dubh played host to a unique version of traditional music with the crowd soaking in the the classic traditional songs blaring from the speakers.

Friday included the Scealta Do Pháisti which took place in the Galway City Library and Charlie Byrne telling wonderful tales of folklore. Both children and parents listened gleefully to the classic stories.

“People don’t realize they have as much Irish as they do and so a festival can be quite scary. But this is not the case with Tonnta because it is a bilingual and it is nice that we are taking advantage of our dual heritage,” says Meabh McDonell, Charlie Byrne’s storyteller for kids for Tonnta festival 2024. 

Bríd Ní Chonghóile,  who is in charge of the overall day-to-day management of Gaillimh le Gaeilge, was delighted with the interaction of the children in the festival and the parents interactions also. “It was great even to see the kids doing rap as Gaeilge, even if you didnt have the language [Gaeilge] you were reconnecting with the cúpla focal,” said Ms Ní Chonghóile.

Saturday 3 February was full of surprises in Eyre Square like a Céilí ball from 2 to 5 and two fire shows by Rogu, an Irish fire, light and movement arts performance and education company.

Sean-nós

Another great hallmark of the festival was the revival of sean-nós music which was prominent in many of the events. The traditional Irish music which is performed as Gaeilge was a great hit amongst the festival-goers. 

“You can immerse yourself in it with being around it, you might not understand the words but, you can feel it,” added Ms Ní Chonghóile.

Hard work of staff rewarded

The Milestone Inventive, Galway City Council, Fáilte Ireland, RTÉ, Plean Teanga Chathair na Gaillimhe and Gaillimh le Gaeilge, An Taibhdhearc, National Irish Language Theatre of Ireland and Galway Culture Company supported the Tonnta festival in 2024.

Staff put the festival together in a remarkable nine weeks.

Great turnout

Ms Ní Chonghóile was delighted with the attendance. “Even with the time of the year, people in January being partied out, but looking at the huge number of people who came – it’s a huge encouragement for us and the work that we do in promotion of the Irish language.”