Liverpool Irish Festival, the UK’s largest Irish arts and culture led festival, today releases its full 2026 programme of close to 40 events and exhibits. Run across ten days (Thurs 15–Sun 25 Oct 2026), with satellite events extending from 1 Oct–2 Nov, the Festival anticipates visits of 7,500–10,000.
Rooted in the story of the 1.8 million Irish Famine poor who entered Liverpool through Clarence Dock between 1845-1853 and those that have followed, this year’s theme — I Am Here — asks what it means to arrive, to stay, and to be seen.
Headline acts include the return of Dublin seven-piece Kíla for the first time in eight years (Fri 16 Oct) and Téada (Fri 23 Oct), celebrating 25 years on the road, both at Liverpool Philharmonic Music Room; the launch of Professor Frank Shovlin’s authorised biography of John McGahern, published by Faber (Sun 18 Oct); and Don Wycherley in the award-winning The Life and Times of Paddy Armstrong (Fri 30–Sat 31 Oct, Unity Theatre). The Festival is opened by someone who really knows what it costs to say I Am Here, transplant survivor, storyteller and musician Enda McCabe (Wed 14 Oct, Liverpool Irish Centre).
This year’s theme, I Am Here, is a declaration of presence. Stating it is an act of arrival, a claim on space and the right to be seen, named and recognised on your own terms. As well as providing rich entertainment and creativity, this year’s programme explores histories that remain painful or contested, including An Gorta Mór (the Great Hunger), the Troubles and institutional abuse in Ireland. The Festival approaches these with care, guided by its published Philosophy for Practice, providing care notices, post-show conversations and signposted support services throughout. New for 2026, access social stories are available for Festival venues, supporting neurodivergent visitors and those with access needs. Bursary places remain available for anyone for whom ticket prices would prevent attendance.
Programme Highlights
Heritage at the heart: The An Gorta Mór vigil (Sun 25 Oct, 10am) retraces The Walk of the Bronze Shoes route from Clarence Dock — entry point for over 1.8 million Irish Famine poor — to St Luke’s Bombed Out Church, leading into the annual An Gorta Mór memorial (1pm), where the commissioned song The Ullaloo will be led by the Liverpool Irish Centre choir. Trail work has been supported by The National Lottery Heritage Fund. New Liverpool Irish Famine Trail tours (Sat 24 Oct) use our trail app and headsets, while a Scotland Road community tour (Sun 18 Oct) visits Vauxhall Neighbourhood Council, St Anthony’s Church and The Rotunda, alongside a South Liverpool walking tour the same afternoon. Shared Lands (Mon 26 Oct, LJMU) shares new research on the Choctaw Nation’s extraordinary 1847 gift to the starving in Ireland sharing an act of solidarity from a people sixteen years into their own forced removal. Our annual Tony Birtill memorial lecture will allow our community to reflect on his legacy (Tue 20 Oct, Liverpool Irish Centre).
Theatre and performance: The Life and Times of Paddy Armstrong (Fri 30–Sat 31 Oct, Unity Theatre) stars Don Wycherley as a man wrongfully convicted fifty years ago, with post-show conversations. Victoria Fradgley’s High Tea (Sat 17 Oct, Liverpool Irish Centre) is a sharp reckoning between two estranged sisters; Geraldine Moloney Judge performs her sell-out Obscured View (Wed 21 Oct, Hope Street Theatre), celebrating Liverpool and Ireland’s shared love of football. New for 2026, Movema and live band The Saltcutters lead a gender-free everyone-dances-with-everyone céilí (Sat 17 Oct, St Bride’s Church).
Music and tradition: Kíla bring three decades of genre-defying sound — from uilleann pipes to djembe — to Liverpool Philharmonic Music Room (Fri 16 Oct). Téada follow (Fri 23 Oct), presented with Return to London Town and supported by Culture Ireland. I Am Here (Thurs 22 Oct, Sefton Park Palm House) gathers over 50 musicians and dancers from the George Ferguson Irish Dance School and Melody Makers. The Phogues (Sat 24 Oct, Liverpool Irish Centre) mark 40 years since The Pogues‘ debut album Red Roses for Me, and two seisiúns (Fri 16 and 23 Oct) offer traditional music at Peter Kavanagh’s, whilst an Irish set dancing course begins Tue 27 Oct at Liverpool Cricket Club.
Literary voices: A full Central Library author day (Sat 17 Oct) offers four free events: Vitor Vicente on a writer’s decade in Ireland; Sue Divin presenting her border-set novel Runaway Road; Doug Devaney on inherited diaspora identity through Black Vinyl; and PJ McKeown’s punk memoir By Acting the Fool. Faber publish Professor Frank Shovlin’s authorised biography of John McGahern (Sun 18 Oct, Victoria Gallery and Museum), followed by the seventh John McGahern Annual Book Prize. Historian Sonja Tiernan celebrates Eva Gore-Booth: Irish radical poet, rebel and reformer (Mon 19 Oct, The Black-E).
Family focus: Family Day (Sat 24 Oct, Museum of Liverpool) features The Armagh Rhymers‘ exclusive Liver Bird story, Merseyside dance schools, Melody Makers and Brave Maeve children’s activities. The Samhain Céilí (Sun 25 Oct, Liverpool Irish Centre) closes the Festival with costume competitions, music and gift bags.
Visual arts and film: In the Window: Adam Frew and Maureen Lynch (1–31 Oct, Bluecoat Display Centre) pairs County Derry porcelain with Dún Laoghaire silver. The St Brigid’s Arms (from 2 Oct, Victoria Gallery and Museum) opens a fictional Irish pub created by and for women of Irish heritage, with tours and Q&As (20 and 22 Oct). Testimony (Sat 2 Nov, The Bluecoat), Aoife Kelleher’s documentary on survivors of the Magdalene Laundries and Mother and Baby Homes, screens with Fréa‘s Renewing Roots programme, followed by conversation.
The Festival previews at 6pm on Wed 14 Oct at Liverpool Irish Centre, featuring musician Enda McCabe — back performing after a kidney transplant — a living embodiment of I Am Here. The Festival’s Cultural Connectedness Exchange Network (#CCEN) gathers for its annual practice day the following morning (Thurs 15 Oct, Victoria Gallery and Museum).
Liverpool Irish Festival Artistic Director and CEO, Emma Smith says: “I Am Here is one of the most political statements a human being can make and one of the most necessary. This year’s programme celebrates presence in all its forms. From Kíla‘s once-in-a-decade return to the women of The St Brigid’s Arms and Testimony, each telling their own stories. We are not afraid to sit with the harder parts of the Irish story, because we have learned silence does not protect people from pain. Everything we programme, we programme with care and everyone with a will to listen, learn and play is warmly invited”.
Programme Information
The full programme is now live. Search by art form, location or chronologically: liverpoolirishfestival.com/events