irishphiladelphia.com

Not one, not two, not three, but MANY Irish festivals are coming our way. Clear your calendars! Also, Gaelic football season starts this week (buy sunscreen now). And there’s much, much more. Read on.

Catch Seamus Begley and Oisin MacDiarmada at Coatesville, take to the dance floor with the Galway Society, help the Little Sisters of the Poor at a Scythian concert, and learn the words “batter up” in Irish: Friday is Irish Heritage Night at the Phiillies. Tickets are going fast.

On Saturday, AOH Notre Dame Div. 1 is hosting a benefit for the family of Brad Fox, a decorated Marine Corps veteran and Plymouth Township police officer who was killed in the line of duty last year. Also coming up: A Hunger Strikers memorial in Gloucester City, the Galway Society Dinner Dance, and Irish Night at the Philadelphia Union’s stadium in Chester.

This week: A little music, a little dancing, a little drama, a little fighting. No, not at your house! See where you can enjoy it all.

Join the Bogside Rogues and other local Irish bands at a mock wake on Saturday, and it’s not for Finnegan. Also coming: two topnotch young performers, Sean Gavin and Jesse Smith, in Lansdale and registration for the new Glenside GAA.

Tempest, the John Byrne Band, Cillian Vallely and Ryan McGiver, and the Jameson Sisters (who will doing a concert at a castle) make this a tuneful week.

A mix of old and new this week. There will be a new Philly Rose of Tralee this weekend; a new play opens that combines a little Irish sports rivalry and a lot of comedy, a staging of Oscar Wilde’s “Salome” at Villanova, an Easter Rising ceremony, and a visit by two award-winning Irish traditional singers of different generations.

Members of Ensemble Galilei, which mix old instruments and Celtic music, will be in Philadelphia this week. Lots of Scottish acts, including the Battlefield Band and Jim Malcom, will be nearby. And his friends in the arts will be roasting and toasting Dublin-born Fergus Carey of Fergie’s Pub (and other establishments) who is an avid supporter of the arts.