Ulster-Scots festival for Belfast in November

THE Ulster-Scots Heritage Council is organising a major five-day Ulster-Scots cultural and musical festival in November.

  The Ulster-Scotch Gaitherin o Bilfawst, on November 9-13, will promote Ulster-Scots as a fully inclusive tradition, aimed at transcending all barriers within Northern Ireland society.

  "Ulster-Scots is a now a mainstream, valued, cultural community in Belfast and throughout  Northern Ireland," confirmed Diane Hoy, development officer with the Heritage Council.

  "The festival will help present the Ulster-Scots culture in Belfast as a vibrant, non-threatening mainstream tradition by engaging young and old and in providing a cultural legacy for future generations," she added.

  Ulster-Scots Agency chief executive George Patton welcomed the organisation of the festival in Belfast and he  said it would enhance culture and music in Northern Ireland's capital city.

  Organisers say the festival is open to all sections of the community in Northern Ireland and all ethnic cultures, in particular, in order to promote and encourage respect for cultural diversity.

  Events will have a  strong youth emphasis, with school groups from across the city taking part in highland and country dancing and in the presentation of Ulster-Scots literature and poetry.

  Belfast City Council is sponsoring the festival and Lord Mayor Councillor Wallace Browne is enthusiastically backing the concept. The various affiliated groups to the Ulster-Scots Heritage Council are involved.

  Over the week, an exhibition of drawings of the Ulster-American United States Presidents by artist the late Frank McKelvey will be shown in the Ulster Museum, alongside an exhibition on the same theme by The Ulster Society.

  The Ulster Society will also present an exhibition in the City Hall on 18th century Ulster-Scots emigration to America.

Various workshops and lectures have been arranged at centres across the city on culture, music and language and the Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association (Northern Ireland branch) is organising a city centre parade.

  On Sunday afternoon, November 13, a church service marking a celebration of the Ulster-Scots language will be held in Fitzroy Presbyterian Church in South Belfast.