Lúnasa at Pantages Theatre (14 March 2025)

Tour Dates

Irish band Lúnasa played a double set of Irish/Celtic traditional music at the Pantages Theatre on Friday, March 14, bringing in a long weekend of Irish celebration with St Patrick’s Day on the horizon.

Before their show, the head of Celtic Junction Arts Center, Cormac Ó Sé, came out to introduce the band. He was excited to bring back the band, having just booked Lúnasa at the same theatre last year, on March 1st, 2024, along with Daoirí Farrell and Jigjam. He also mentioned that the first time he saw the group, it was in Australia, 26 years ago.

With that said, Lúnasa came on stage, from left to right: flutist Kevin Crawford, piper Cillian Vallely, fiddler Colin Farrell, guitarist Ed Boyd, and bassist Trevor Hutchinson. The band was named after Lughnasadh, an ancient harvest festival, and they play both traditional and contemporary Irish music.

Kevin did most of the talking, introducing a set of songs (usually three songs). They started with a couple of tracks that they released on Live in Kyoto (featuring ten new tracks recorded live at Taku Taku club in Japan). Most of these new songs were written by Cillian, who has a certain style of song writing. His go-to is to write a good first and third acts… the middle doesn’t really matter. Usually the third song in their mini-sets picks up, often inspiring the audience to clap along. So that last song is quite upbeat and ends with a strong finish.

As the concert continues, you learn a piece of each band member. For example, Trevor, the bassist, has a mad idea of renting identical vans and slowly swapping the engine… one piece at a time. My favorite is Ed, who was pointed out as having a wrinkled shirt because he didn’t bring an iron on tour. Ed took that and ran with it, adding that the clothing was causing chafing. Before we had the opportunity to ask, “you don’t want to know, but it’s my upper thighs.”

Highlight of their set was for one of their songs, a group of Kickin’ It Irish dancers danced their way on stage. It was really fun, and had me looking up these dancers and found out that it was created in 2013 to feature Championship dancers from O’Shea Irish Dance. There are four more Kickin’ It Irish shows – March 15 (two shows), March 16, and ending on St Patrick’s Day at Chanhassen Dinner Theatres. This will be a great way of celebrating all-things-Irish.

The band would then return with a second set of their show. The second set is a little loose and not as structured as the first set. The band could probably play for another six hours, pulling from their vast discography (over eight albums to choose from). The band admitted that they need to move with the times, as people don’t want to buy CDs. Instead, thanks to Trevor’s idea, they are selling music (with unreleased videos) on USB thumb drives. And if you don’t like it, “You can always put good stuff on it.”

Lúnasa’s Live in Kyoto is out now.