‘Stone Mad’ storytelling festival takes place in Mayo

The ‘Stone Mad’ Storytelling Festival took place in Mayo this bank holiday weekend.

The festival kicked off in the Joyce Country and Western Lakes Geopark area on Friday.

Venues in Finney, The Neale, Clonbur, Cong, Ballinrobe and elsewhere in the area were host to a wide programme of events in varied genres of the art of storytelling all with the odd cup of tea, or stronger, in hand! 

_{Stone Mad, The Joyce Country and Western Lakes Geopark inaugural Storytelling Festival , was officially launched at Ballinrobe Library recently (Photo: Trish Forde)}

Significantly, local groups also hosted and participated in the activities, including Women’s/Men’s Sheds, Ciorcail Comhrá, writers groups, primary schools and community groups in the Geopark area.

This inaugural running of the Festival emerged from the partnership of the Mourne, Gullion and Strangford Geopark in County Down and the Joyce Country and Western Lakes Geopark. 

With support from the Shared Island fund at the Department of Foreign Affairs, the two Geoparks have engaged with each other to set up useful channels of transfer of know-how and methods and models by which a Geopark can evolve a positive economic dividend for its participating communities. 

“Everybody likes a story and better still if it’s told in style,” said Trish Walsh, Chair of GeoEnterprise, the cross-community Geopark group and key organiser of this event. 

“Without tampering with the integrity of this ancient art form, we wondered if this tradition of storytelling can be ‘productised,’ so to speak. Our partners in County Down have proven it most definitely can!”, she added.

_{Trish Walsh (GeoEnterprise Chairperson) speaking at the Festival’s launch in Ballinrobe Library (Photo: Trish Forde)}

The successful Storytelling festival in Hilltown, County Down, ‘The Gathering’, which runs in early March each year, has set the bar on how to cleverly exploit and blend the various genres of storytelling and bring it to audiences in a totally different and most engaging way. 

The organisers of that event assisted the Joyce Country Geopark partners in putting on last weekend’s event.

“We have made a great Community event of this in our area in County Down, and we look forward to seeing the same rolling out in your communities,” concluded Martina Byrne, organiser of ‘The Gathering’ in Hilltown.