Kilkenny Arts Festival mixes risk and safe-bets in search of magical chance

One of the great beauties of Ireland’s summer arts festivals has always been the element of random chance. You go to see one thing, and find yourself falling in love with another. At a loose end on a Tuesday morning, you pop into a church and get your socks knocked off by an art installation or a classical concert, when you’ve actually gone for the latest Shakespeare. You have chats in cafés, and more, later on in bars. I have done all these things at the Kilkenny Arts Festival, and always ended up thinking, as the man said in the song: wouldn’t it be great if it was like this all the time…?

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