THE National Celtic Festival is only weeks away and more than 15,000 revellers will immerse themselves in a sea of Celtic acts on Portarlington\u2019s foreshore.<\/p>\n
Amongst the local and global stars locked in to perform over the long weekend (June 8-11) on one of 14 stages is Australian Celtic rock band Claymore and William Hutton (lead singer) said his band hadn\u2019t missed a festival yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really love playing at the Celtic festival and haven\u2019t missed a year yet. The festival has grown in leaps and bounds, pretty much form a local and statewide type festival to a truly international\u00a0event,\u201d Mr Hutton said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe festival attracts so many international performers who are really keen to play. It\u2019s certainly starting to get up there, it\u2019s the biggest purely Celtic festival in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe always try and bring something new every\u00a0time we come, we also have a lot of classic favourite everybody loves if we drop them off we get into trouble.\u201d<\/p>\n
The multi-instrumentalists not only manage to combine traditional elements of Celtic music with rock, they also write beautiful original Celtic compositions, and lend their style to some power rock classics, all with an Irish and Scottish twist.<\/p>\n
Mr Hutton said they\u2019ve done the festival so many times and family and friends always come along and sing their songs before they\u2019re even on stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a great family atmosphere, we get everyone from three years to 90 years old. We always get plenty of time to take in the festival, the beauty of being in Claymore is we get the late shift so get to watch the festival all day. Altan are coming this year, they\u2019re one of the biggest Irish bands on the planet,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe festival\u2019s just full of brilliant national and international acts. I was born into and brought up with the Celtic culture, although I\u2019ve made Australia\u00a0home your heart is often where you are born; I consider myself a Celtic Australian.\u201d<\/p>\n
For tickets, go to nationalcelticfestival.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
THE National Celtic Festival is only weeks away and more than 15,000 revellers will immerse themselves in a sea of Celtic acts on Portarlington\u2019s foreshore. Amongst the local and global stars locked in to perform over the long weekend (June 8-11) on one of 14 stages is Australian Celtic rock band Claymore and William Hutton […]<\/p>\n