As part of this year’s festival, Tuam-based Sparkcatchers worked with participants from Ability West's Headford Hub for a ‘Big Dreams’ project. The programme included creating costumes, photographs, poetry, songwriting, and visual art.

Thousands expected to attend Headford Community Arts Festival

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A BEETHOHOVEN bicentenary concert, an evening with an award winning novelist and an all-female visual arts programme are among the highlights of Something in the Water 2026, Headford's community arts festival.

The five-day programme began on Wednesday September 30 and runs until Sunday October 4. It will bring music, theatre, literature, film, dance and visual art to venues in the North Galway town, including utilising vacant premises that will be reinvigorated for the festival.

This year's programme includes a Beethoven bicentenary concert from the newly formed Kantos Quartet on Sunday October 4 in St Fursa’s Parish Hall from 5:30pm to 7pm.

They will present a programme which looks both to the music of the 1920s and to the upcoming bicentenary of Beethoven’s death in 1827.

There’s also an evening with Rooney Prize-winning novelist Elizabeth Reapy on Thursday October 1. She will join fellow authors Alan McMonagle and Patrick Doherty, the latter travelling home from Spain for an event that takes places in the Anglers Rest Hotel at 8pm.

Another festival highlight will be the visual arts programme, which has been curated entirely around the work of five female artists: Yana Nungesser, Kathleen McMahon, Cat Coogan, alongside locally based artists Sophie Jackson and Kate Kelly.

Local artist Kate Kelly will undertake a fascinating audio visual project as part of the festival, aiming to capture the mood of contemporary female voices in Ireland.

Kate will also be undertaking a fascinating audio-visual project in association with the festival. Her aim is to capture the mood of contemporary female voices in Ireland, allowing female participants to co-create an important socially engaged new work.

Across four days of the festival, she will invite women of all ages to explore and record responses to the question: ‘Are female voices heard, and are female voices valued, in contemporary Irish society?’

Inclusivity has always been an important factor for the organisers, and in the run-up to this year’s festival, they approached Tuam-based artists Midie Corcoran and Jojo Hynes of Sparkcatchers, as well as Ability West Headford Hub.

Together, they established the ‘Big Dreams’ of each participant and then realised them in a fun and creative way. The programme included creating costumes, photographs, poetry, songwriting, and visual art.

Photographs of everyone involved in the programme are available to view in the windows of the Headford Hub Ability West, on Main Street, George’s Square, throughout the festival.

Hundreds of artists and entertainers will perform across the festival, with thousands expected to turn out to participate in and experience the workshops, shows, exhibitions and demonstrations.

Accomplished folk singer and musician Dave Clancy from Corofin will lead a concert in The Angler’s Rest on Sunday night, October 4. He will also host a songwriting workshop for teens and adults at Campbell’s Tavern earlier that day.

Among the hands-on creative events are an ‘Everybody Has A Story’ workshop with storyteller and comedian Amy Walsh, which is being held in Campbell’s Tavern at 12 on Saturday October 3.

‘Message In a Bottle,’ a children’s craft workshop is being hosted at Headford Library at 2:30pm Friday October 2; while a songwriting workshop for teenagers and young adults with accomplished folk singer and musician Dave Clancy takes place on Sunday Oct 4 at 1:30pm in Campbell’s Tavern.

A full programme of events is available to view by visiting the Something in the Water Headford Facebook page. Tickets to festival events are available to purchase at www.tickettailor.com/.

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