26-27 September 2026

@ The Barbican

William St., Moneymore, Drogheda

Bigger and better than ever!

This year we’ve expanded the festival to a 2 day event, giving participants even more opportunities to meet, collaborate and create incredible new music!
Our mentor team has expanded, with the addition of some world-class talent providing workshops on The Art of Writing to Pitch, Write To Rise, Transforming Real Life Stories into Powerful Songs and Finding Fun in Creativity.
Two of our most experienced mentors, SJ McArdle and Keith Burke, will be on hand during the Sunday in their Song Surgery to help songwriters polish their songs til they sparkle.
Participants will get the chance to perform their new creations at the festival’s closing event – the Gala Concert, where one song will be chosen to be professionally recorded for a day in XXXX studios.
This year we will based almost exclusively in the Barbican Centre in Drogheda, where we will have multiple rooms available to provide space for participants to team up, find a spot to work and develop their brand new songs

A whole weekend of creativity!

Saturday:

Registration will take place on Saturday morning, followed by the workshops, which will continue into the afternoon, with ample time allowed between the events for participants to start their creative process.
As always, attendance at two different workshops is included in the ticket cost.
Differently from previous years’ schedules, it is now the mentors that will move between sessions, which should mean more time for creativity and less stress about making it to the next venue.
Saturday’s official events will culminate in the Mentors’ songwriters-in-the-round event, held in the Barbican main theatre, which has always been an incredibly inspirational part of the festival.
This will also mark the end of official events for the day. It is the organisers’ intention that this happen at around 6pm, in order to give everyone the chance for a well deserved break after all their efforts on the day.
For those who haven’t yet had enough music for the day, we will also be organising an informal meetup and jam in Peggy Moores later in the evening. Here, participants will be able to perform some of their own material that they have previously written, as well as to continue to network with the rest of their fellow festival goers and mentors.
On the day, make sure you’re early to ensure prompt commencements of the various events.

Parking will be available in the underground car park next to the Barbican.
If you play an instrument and use it as part of your songwriting process, be sure to bring it along!
For the piano/keyboard players amongst the participants, the festival is making efforts to ensure there are a couple of rudimentary keyboards available. However, it would still be more advantageous for participants to bring their own if they rely heavily on their instrument for writing.

Sunday:

On Sunday, participants will have space in the Barbican to meet up with their co-writers to finish off the work begun the day before.
Mentors Keith Burke and SJ McArdle will be holding their Song Surgery from XXX am to XXX pm, where they will provide a fresh ear and advice to help the new songs become the best they can be.
The Gala Concert event in the Barbican main theatre on Sunday evening, where participants will get their opportunity to perform their new creations to their peers, has proved to be the highlight of the festival in previous years – at once both an exciting and a moving experience.
At the end of the Gala Concert one song will be chosen to go forward for professional recording in XXXX studios.

Reflecting the feedback from our participants at previous events, the festival will take place over two days in order to provide a lot more time for participants to work on their songs - especially on the Saturday, when collaborators will be in the early stages of developing their new creative partnership.
Even though the event is now over a weekend, we’ve worked very hard to make sure the tickets are still very affordable, with no additional ticket being needed for the second day. So, even if you can only make it for the Saturday, you’ll still have a great experience.

Songwriting Mentors

Maria McCormack is a singer-songwriter from County Donegal. She has released two acclaimed albums, I Choose to Love (2019) and Matters of the Heart (2023), both of which received national and international radio airplay. Known for her honest storytelling and distinctive voice, Maria writes across folk, country, and contemporary genres. She is a core member of the Wild Atlantic Women collective and the founder and host of the Go West Songwriting Retreat - Donegal.

Artist, mother, sister + community-builder, Áine Tyrrell is grounded in song, story, and shared responsibility, creating music as both medicine + resistance, weaving culture, community, and social change into a living practice. A thought provoking, fearless multi-instrumentalist songwriter, she defies labels + blends genres. At the heart of it all is her unmistakable voice, electric and intimate, stirring memory + reckoning while inviting us to rise, belong + build something braver for those who come after.

Lauded by industry giants like Paul Williams (writer for The Carpenters/Barbra Streisand) Graham Nash (The Hollies/Crosby, Stills and Nash) Enya & more, Gavin’s unique blend of soft jazz and contemporary Folk music has charmed audiences right across the world.

David Hope is an independent Irish singer-songwriter who has spent more than two decades on the road, quietly building a reputation as one of Ireland’s most compelling modern troubadours. Armed with a road-worn acoustic guitar, a weather-beaten voice and a sharp, self-aware wit, he has toured relentlessly across Ireland, the UK and mainland Europe, earning his stripes in pubs, theatres and arts venues alike. Rooted in rural County Clare, his songs carry the grain of lived experience and the restless instinct of an artist who has always done things his own way.

2026 Workshop Schedule

Critically acclaimed songwriter SJ McArdle will present a workshop themed around Story Songs, exploring the art of creating new songs from old stories with an engaging and emotional perspective. Particular emphasis is placed on sense language, arresting lyrics and sympathetic melody and chord writing.
SJ is a songwriter, musician and curator, critically-acclaimed at home and abroad. He is known for his PORT project and its accompanying RTE Radio 1 Album Of The Week Old Ghosts In The Water, his previous work in award-winning folk band Kern and his career as a singer-songwriter in Nashville and Germany, which produced 2014’s critically-acclaimed Blood and Bones album. SJ’s songs and performances have been featured in radio, film and television and he has toured and recorded extensively in Ireland, Europe and North America.

Dublin Songwriter and Skerries native Keith Burke has released three original albums. "The Dancer who Stole your Shoes" in 2004, "No One Wants to Move" in 2008 and “These Boys” in 2016.
Keith has played concerts in (and been invited back to) Pittsburgh USA, Cairo Egypt and Beirut Lebanon. He has played televised concerts in Italy, dates in the 2005 Guinness Cork Jazz festival and received the Hotpress "Pick of the fortnight". His music has been played on national Irish radio on RTE 1, Radio Na Gaeltachta and NewsTalk, as well as many regional radio stations. He was selected as the late Tony Fenton’s “daily download”. A song of his was used for the credits on a TV show on Setanta Sports. The late great saxophonist John Earle plays on several of his recordings. He’s played support to Irish bands Bagatelle and Aslan and in Bavaria, Germany, touring band “Mac C&C Celtic Four” regularly close their energetic live shows with Keith’s song “Love and Romans”.
Keith has written, arranged and with the help of producer Anthony Gibney, recorded his new album in Audioland Studios in Lexlip. Singles “I’ll begin this letter” and “Before you go” were well received and played on national and regional radio stations in Ireland and the UK. His latest single “That’s where the bees loved to go” was released on 12th April 2024.