Dublin Irish Festival's Skerryvore, We Banjo 3 and Dervish delighted audiences on Saturday

Day No. 2 of the 35th annual Dublin Irish Festival woke to dark clouds and threats of storms. By the early afternoon it eased a bit and like clockwork the droves came out. The popular summer festival was back in full force after a year off due to the pandemic and then last summer's abbreviated event.

The smoothly-run fest was ready for all, offering seven stages of live music with four more spaces for workshops and cultural events, never mind several large clusters for merchants, artisans, and myriad food options.

Taking it all in was impossible; catching all the interesting musical acts, daunting.

For instance, if you showed up at the main entrance late afternoon to catch Skerryvore on the Celtic Rock Stage, you had to walk past the three other largest stages. I found it difficult to walk past the huge Dublin Stage without sitting for a moment to hear Slide, an Irish dance band that featured the manic dancing of fiddler Daire Bracken. (His inventive playing was smoking as well.)

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The Trinity Stage hosted a large part of history in Rory Makem and Donal Clancy, sons respectively of Tommy Makem and Liam Clancy, whose partnership in the early 1960s defined Irish music worldwide. The sons had a lovely balance in their voices, Makem’s more gentle and lyrical singing tempering Clancy’s stout and proud vocals.

Strolling past the Irish Thunder Stage without lingering was difficult, that is unless you don’t respond to the sound of an army of bagpipes. The Great Lakes Pipe Band was wailing like a herd of animals from the stage in front of a bowl-like lawn filled to the brim with spectators.

The Celtic Rock Stage is set in a huge field far from the rest of the stages for a reason. It features electrified, mostly loud, Celtic-based music that crosses over to wider audiences. Still, Skerryvore was not so far from the traditional dance groups that played on the smaller stages, only the crowd was so large it spilled out of the huge tent for 30 feet in back as well as at the sides.

The Scottish six-piece was laying down a fevered groove with “Walk With Me,” a wonderful mix of Celtic dance with Cajun two-step. The highlights of its set featured fierce instrumental duels, frequently involving the Highland pipes. Travelling without drums, the band made due with foot pedals for kick drum and a special attachment on the guitar that allowed the guitarist to play simple bass lines. The drum part, in particular, became a bit annoying after a bit. Skerryvore was dynamic enough by itself to forego the added boost.

We Banjo 3  got their high energy dance tunes across without such trappings. When the band made their debut at the festival nine years ago, this reviewer was mightily impressed by their modern update of the tradition and the influence of Appalachian music. Not only did the still-young band hold true to those qualities this weekend on the Celtic Rock Stage but they also have managed to attract a huge following.

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Getting back to the main group of stages — across a bridge, past lines of fast food tents from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, and avoiding the temptation to watch dart throwing pros at the dart bar — made the appointment with the next group difficult to meet.

The special tent for the “Irish In Film,” in fact, was too hard to resist. It was filled with dozens of press photos of Irish Hollywood stars and directors, original movie posters dating back to the silent era, newspaper clippings, and essays in tribute to many of them.

Who knew that Anthony Quinn, Gregory Peck  and John Cusak were all Irish? Among the actors, of course, there were the obvious, such as Brian Dennehy and the ubiquitous — seemingly, in nearly every small Irish film of the past 25 years — Colm Meaney. It was nice to see director John Ford get his spotlight with two large panels representing his work, as well as John Huston, with a bio and lovely poster from his last film “The Dead,” even if he wasn’t represented as well for directing many better-known films, including “The Maltese Falcon” and “African Queen.”

Getting to the next destination became even harder, walking past the Trinity Stage where Connla was holding court with a stripped down trio of Irish harp, whistle, and the small Uilleann Irish pipes, whose sound can be alternately impossibly sad or rowdy dance accompaniment.

But Dervish called next door at the Dublin Stage. The classic Irish traditional band is strong as ever after 33 years, and its performance Saturday night didn’t disappoint a bit. Lead singer Cathy Jordan broke hearts with ballads, whooped through dance tunes and played a mean bodhran (hand-held Irish drum.) A set of dance tunes from the group’s native County Sligo set the pace from the start. The fierce soloing on fiddle, flute and accordion was buoyed by mandola, bouzouki and Jordan’s skillful drumming. Another couple of sets were later balanced by ballads and sing-alongs before diving back into the fray. “A Fair Maid,” from the band’s first album in 1992 was a highlight, with Jordan strumming a ukulele.

Next door Socks In The Frying Pan found a passionate audience after having appeared at the festival three years ago. The trio built considerable energy, to the delight of the crowd of fans, with just guitar, accordion and fiddle. The unison lines with fiddle and accordion were a marvel of musicianship.

All of the acts in this article, except the Great Lakes Pipe Band, will appear again Sunday, as the Irish Festival concludes, and Eileen Ivers will perform Sunday as well.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Dublin Irish Festival musical acts draw large crowds on Saturday