17th Annual Saline Celtic Festival: City of Saline.
July 13 & 14. Saline’s celebration of its sister city, Brecon, Wales, features food, beer and clan tents, kids activities, and Celtic music and dance on 3 stages by visiting and local performers. The festival kicks off July 13 (5:30 p.m.-late evening) with “Pub in the Park” ($5 admission; kids age 12 & under & active military personnel, free), featuring a pub tent, food, and performances by New Orleans singer-songwriter Beth Patterson and the local traditional and contemporary Irish music band Road Kilt. The Friday evening party also includes the popular Mr. Pretty Legs in a Kilt contest and limerick readings. July 14: Competitive Highland dance (10 a.m.), a 5-km race (time TBA), a pipe bands competition (early afternoon), a “Wee Folks Island” of kids activities (noon-5 p.m.), historical reenactments, jousting, fencing demos, the popular Haggis Hurl, the Celtic Clobber (a balance-beam pillow fight contest), and more. Live music includes Detroit Celtic roots music band The Bowzies, the local Celtic and Americana fiddle/cello duo The Moxie Strings, Beth Patterson (see above), the Canadian Celtic and roots music band Rant Maggie Rant, the local Fiddlers ReStrung, the local Commonwealth Dance Collective, dancers from the Ealain Ceime Irish Dance School, the award-winning fiddle virtuoso Eileen Ivers and her band Immigrant Soul, NYC Celtic rock band Seven Nations, and The Tartan Terrors, a Canadian septet that blends rousing bagpipe-driven Celtic music and Highland dance with comic mayhem. No pets.
5:30 p.m.-late evening (July 13) & 9 a.m.–midnight (July 14), Mill Pond Park, end of W. Bennett St., west of Ann Arbor St., Saline. Tickets $10 in advance at salineceltic.org; $15 (seniors, $12; youth ages 13-17, $5; kids age 12 & under and active military personnel, free; $10 general admission after 8 p.m.) at the gate. 944–2810.
