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GOAL NextGen offers music, dance & food at St. Patrick’s Festival Quarter

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GOAL NextGen is set to take this year's St Patrick’s Day Festival by storm, bringing creative collaborations, cultural conversations and a healthy dose of twerking to the celebrations with a trio of spaces at the Festival Quarter in Collins Barracks, from 12pm – 5pm, on Saturday 16th March. Access to all GOAL NextGen events is completely free. No ticket is required and entry is on a first come, first served basis, subject to capacity. The theme of this year’s St Patrick's Festival celebrations is 'Spréach', the Irish word for spark, which is fitting, as GOAL NextGen’s chart-topping song ‘Spark’ will be performed live for the first time at the festival.

The GOAL NextGen spaces at the festival include:

The GOAL Global Stage: the open air stage sees an electrifying musical and dance line up from an exciting and diverse range of performers – get ready to dance along! Whether you want to be first to hear Celaviedmai’s recent number one, or learn how to do the slick back challenge.  

Full line up:

  • 12pm: Mariachi San Patricio (the only Mexican/Irish mariachi band in Ireland) will bring the vibrant spirit of Jalisco to the festival quarter.
  • 12.50pm: Bollywood: Traditional Indian Folk and Contemporary Dance led by Dharmendra Ohja from the Dharmendra Bollywood Dance School will take to the stage.
  • 1:55pm Mo Cultivation (a community of DJs, live musicians and MCs that bring the very best of urban culture) will bring their infectious beats to the stage, uniting music lovers, DJs, and dancers for an unforgettable experience filled with non-stop grooves and singalongs.
  • 2.40pm: Lapree Lala (Galway based Afrodance Dancer/Instructor/Choreographer) and the Southside Moves crew will hit the stage to keep the energy high, with their blend of amapiano, afro house, Ndombolo, and more, followed by a twerk workshop that’ll have you moving.
  • 3:45pm: Celaviedmai (one of Ireland’s hottest young female rappers, songwriters and performers, fast becoming one of the biggest names in Irish hip-hop) will light up the stage with her chart-topping hit ‘Spark’, alongside a showcase of young, up- and-coming talents. Her curated line up includes: Salamay, Toshín and Becky McNeice AKA Dr Becks.

GOAL NextGen in the Tigín: the Tigín will be an indoor seated space providing the perfect backdrop for fun and foodie conversations, celebrating our individual stories and creating opportunities for connection. Conversations will include the story of hospitality and our heritage as the land of a hundred thousand welcomes, and also about our food and the role food plays in our culture and memories. Artist Jennie Moran will host the Tigín activities.

Full line up:

  • 2:50-3:35pm: The Story of Hospitality: this will dive into the heartwarming origins of welcoming strangers, exploring why hospitality is so ingrained in our daily lives. Performance artist Aoibhinn O’Dea will host a lively workshop infused with theatre.
  • 3.55-4.30pm: Breaking Bread: sets out on a culinary adventure into our food memories and the stories we share through meals. Expect interactive fun in this workshop as you and your workshop buddy create unique drawings inspired by prompts that will have you reminiscing about your favourite culinary triumphs and terrors.

GOAL NextGen Stand: The GOAL NextGen team will be on hand in Clarke Square throughout the day to chat, dance and connect. They will be sharing merchandise, including hats, t-shirts, and notebooks designed in collaboration with Irish Nigerian artist Grace Enemaku. The merchandise is inspired by a visual created by Grace for the GOAL NextGen iTunes chart-topping song 'Spark'. The team will gift merchandise to people who share their thoughts and opinions as part of GOAL NextGen's research on what ‘home’ means to us.

A key highlight of the festival line up is seeing GOAL NextGen’s creative collaborations get an even bigger stage as Celaviedmai, who will present a lineup of new talent, also performs her GOAL NextGen collab ‘Spark’ that reached number one in the Irish charts last year. ‘Spark’ was written by Irish/Ivorian singer Celaviedmai with Evan Flaherty & Darragh Purcell from Irish band Scoth. The song celebrates how a united global community can nurture hope and positivity amid an alarming mix of crises across the world. Global collaborators included Ethiopian saxophonist Gene Tesfa, and DJ Edna Martinez from Colombia who produced the track.

Celaviedmai, headliner on the GOAL Global stage, said, "I'm really excited to bring my collaboration with GOAL NextGen to the stage for the first time. I was so excited when we launched ‘Spark’ and it shot straight to number one on iTunes. I’m even more excited to be able to curate a show at such a fantastic event like St. Patrick's Festival, as I've had the idea of 'Who's Next?' for a long time. The incredible Salamay, Toshín and Becky McNeice will join me on the GOAL Global stage on March 16th and I'm more than proud to give them their flowers, as they are all exciting artists in very different ways. I hope to see people come through and see who's next up in Ireland!"

Speaking about the GOAL Global Stage coming to the St Patrick's Day Festival, Victoria Walshe, GOAL's Global Citizenship Manager, said, "This is our second year at the St Patrick's Day Festival. We’re so proud to be adding to the incredibly diverse line up at the festival. Through our work, we want to platform new voices and fresh ideas – the festival gives us a space to connect with people in a really creative way. St Patrick’s Day is a time when we celebrate the beautiful breadth of what it means to be Irish today. We are at a point when so many young people are disillusioned and marginalised, so it’s more important than ever to show up in the spaces of culture and creativity that resonate with them. The festival also gives us an opportunity to kickstart some research on what home and belonging means to Irish people today. Come talk and dance with us! We can’t wait to ‘Spark’ more connections."

GOAL NextGen hits festival quarter on Saturday 16th March from 12pm-5.30pm. More information about the GOAL Global Stage at the St Patrick’s Day Festival is available here. Access to all GOAL NextGen events is completely free.

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