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The Dalriada Festival is Northern Ireland's biggest cultural and heritage festival or sport, music and fine foods and takes place in the village of Glenarm annually in July, attracting in excess of 20,000 people. The main events take place at Glenarm Castle and include Highland Games, fine foods, celebrity chef demonstrations, performing arts, live music, craft stalls and children's entertainment.
As part of the festival Glenarm Castle also hosts large outdoor concerts known as DalriadaLIVE. So far artists who have appeared at DalriadaLIVE include General Fiasco, Duke Special, Amici, The Priests, Brian Houston, David Phelps, Ronan Keating, Sharon Corr, Nathan Carter and Lisa McHugh. Glenarm village and the local area provides the backdrop for the sporting events such as a triathlon, kids duathlon, mountain run, football, shinty, rowing regatta and horse hunt chase. The village also hosts numerous community based events including a treasure hunt, fun run, it's a knockout, foraging walk and so on. In 2013 additional events were added to the festival programme including a hiring fair and a super endurocross competition at the old quarry in Glenarm. 2014 saw the festival's biggest crowd yet with over 25,000 in attendance with even more events added to the programme. The festival week traditionally comes to end with a street carnival, live music and fireworks finale.
The 2015 Dalriada Festival will take place from 17-25 July however dates have still to be confirmed by the festival organisers.