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2019 Featured Performers
Old Blind Dogs
“The skill, talent, and verve with which they played belied their laddishness and the crowd responded with thunderous applause. Folk is the new rock and roll.” – Evening News
“The Old Blind Dogs play with a compelling energy and intoxicating rhythm; players and audience seem to share a wild ecstasy of emotion.” – The Scotsman
“Old Blind Dogs have mastered the tricky art of innovating within a musical tradition while faithfully revealing its essence.” – Acoustic Guitar
England/Scotland
Aberdeenshire, Scotland
Séamus Flaherty’s skills in dancing, singing and playing instruments reflect his personality. At only nineteen years old, Séamus meets each discipline with a passion and quiet zeal backed up by a love of the traditional Irish music heritage. Since the age of sixteen, he has been making waves in the fields of music, dance and singing across the globe; performing in China, U.S.A, Canada, The United Kingdom, Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium, Holland and France. He had the privilege of performing more recently alongside Cherish the Ladies at the world renowned Celtic Connection
The Confiers is made up of five young musicians, all of whom are rooted in a strong musical background. While their music is energetic lively and has a wholesome sound, the band members strive to remain true to a traditional repertoire rooted in the regions of Clare, Sliabh Luachra and Donegal. This is also shown through their repertoire of songs both in English and Irish. The Confers met while studying traditional music at the University of Limerick and have since developed a lasting friendship, which is evident in their music. In 2018 they won first place in the prestigious Michigan Irish Music Initiative competition in Dundalk.
The band includes singer and bodhrán player, 
Guitarist and singer 
Conor O’Loughlin
Erin Thorin is a musician based in Lyons, Colorado. Raised in a musical family, his first professional engagement was playing trombone next to his father in a big band. Current projects include 
Fiddler Jessie Burns comes from a mix of English, Irish and American cultures and has explored the folk music of each of these countries from a young age, thanks to the encouragement of her large, musical family. She has lived on three continents and has traveled extensively and no matter where she has ended up, she’s found welcoming Irish and folk music groups to play with and form community. Her main instrument is the fiddle, but she also plays piano, tenor banjo and mandolin. Most recent adventures include six unforgettable years touring internationally for over 200 days a year with American-Irish Supergroup 
Jon fell in love with music at an early age, listening to the 70’s folk albums in his mother’s record collection. He journeyed on to rock music, passed through the realm of electronic dance music, made his way on to West African percussion, and finally landed in the world of traditional Irish music. Jon’s passion for music has taken him all over the world, from the beautiful countryside of France to study with master fingerstyle guitar player Pierre Bensusan, to Senegal, West Africa, to study Sabar Drumming, and eventually to reside in Ireland in 2008. There he refined his skills in interpreting Irish music while earning his Master of Arts degree in Traditional Irish Music Performance at the University of Limerick.
Looking Back to 2018
Before we look forward to the 2019 Festival lineup, last year’s Festival deserves an appreciative retrospection. In many ways, it was one of the most amazing Festivals we’ve had in our fourteen years. On June 26th the Festival leadership was working on the details of a summer fundraising campaign, including an event at the Cuchara Mountain Park. Meantime, Artistic Director Pat McCullough had arranged for a performer lineup that highlighted individual and small group talent. We were busy working out possible combinations of performers for our larger venues that such a lineup might afford us.
Then June 27th happened! What began as a small fire on the western slopes of the southern Sangre de Cristos rapidly spread, producing an eerie smokey orange sky over Huerfano County.
Despite the strangeness of the day, few of us understood the scope of changes that were coming. Eighteen days later, all but the most northwesterly border of the fire had been contained, but in those eighteen days many in the County had been evacuated from their homes, and the rest (La Veta) remained on a pre-evacuation status. Festival fundraising plans were shelved, and daily concerns were focused on the spread of the fire, and the impact on friends and neighbors. Those who weren’t fighting the fire watched daily from whatever safe spot they had.
Photo by Tomi Price
Photo by Heather Curtis
Then, after July 15th, those of us working on the Festival began to find our footing again. There were questions to address. Uptop, Cuchara, and Gardner, the venues that open the Festival each year, all amazingly survived the fire, but could they be readied in time? How would the uncertainties due to the fire effect ticket sales? And, oh yes, there were still those performer schedules, and the school program, to work out.
Fast forward to the third week of September. The concept for last year was “Traditions Alive,” the notion that the traditional roots of Celtic music continue to find life in a variety of fresh expression. Our vision was that the exceptional musicians we had lined up would find those common roots in each other, and then, by giving them a stage together, music would happen. And happen it did! Many, including musicians, said it happened “magically”. And, perhaps, nowhere more so than at the late night sessions. These sessions are always free to all, including professionals, semi-professionals, amateurs, and listeners. Performers such as Patsy O’Brien, Colin Farrel, Cormac de Barra, Dylan Foley, Joey Abarta, Máirtín de Cógáin, and Kevin Crawford led the sessions into the wee hours of the next day. It was a true taste of the musical magic that happened from beginning to end.
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
That same chemistry evolved during the demos, workshops and concerts. Enjoy a few more images from last year’s magic, and then begin looking forward to this coming September.
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
Photo by Bob Kennemer
2016 Festival Memories
“We are rarely rendered speechless by our experiences on the road but yesterday was one of them! For the last few weeks these HS kids have been rehearsing ‘Schooldays Over’, ‘Goodnight Irene’ and ‘The Boys are Back in Town’ and yesterday we finally got to sing them together. Ladies & Gentlemen, the Walsenburg High School Choral Singers!! After we took this photo we performed these songs live together in front of an audience, including the WORLD EXCLUSIVE first-ever performance of ‘The Boys Are Back in Town’ Take a bow boys and girls, each and every one of you were amazing!! #proud — in Walsenburg, Colorado.”
~The High Kings
“I’m hoping you will forward this message to all the Board and the Volunteers who made our weekend so great! We loved it, working with the HS kids in Walsenburg was a highlight, as was the show on Saturday, and then those special talks and performances on Sunday! Thanks to all for your very kind hospitality, we will never forget it.”
~Paddy McPoland
Tour Manager
The High Kings
Dublin, Ireland
Defining the Festival
The Spanish Peaks Celtic Festival is designed as an intimate four-day gathering led by renowned guest artists, teachers, and scholars from Celtic countries abroad, Canada, and the United States. The Festival offers over 60 different events, including major concerts; two singing programs; instrumental workshops and master classes; a series of demonstration talks and performances on aspects of Celtic music, history, and folklore; a Celtic Harp Retreat; a newly established Piping Retreat; and sprinkled throughout are ceilidhs/ceilis and playing sessions where anyone can freely join in or enjoy as an audience. Finally, the friendly ambiance and spontaneous interplay between artists and participants spark the exciting sharing of music, ideas, and knowledge, all reflected gifts from the fullness of a rich Celtic experience.
We thank you for coming and sharing this experience with us.
The Festival Board
We invite you to embrace music that reflects the rousing spirit of Celts past and present, whose songs haunt us with their pure beauty or make us laugh with their bold humor, and whose tunes, be they deeply rooted or newly composed, are as delicate as the lilt of a flute on the air or as explosive and exciting as the jigs and reels that fly from a fiddler’s bow, lifting your feet right off the ground –music as compelling today as it was a hundred years ago.
