The Irish Cultural Society of the Pacific Northwest (hosts of the Sean-nós Northwest Festival) will be hosting another Irish language intensive coming up the weekend of May16 & 17th 2015 in Portland, OR.

We are thrilled that Imelda White, a gifted teacher and native speaker from Ard a' Rátha, Co. Donegal, will be our guest instructor for the weekend along with Bob Burke, Jacinta Keyes-Hanlon, and Brian Ó hAirt! Those of you who have taken Imelda’s classes at various events in the past will know what a great opportunity this will be!

For those of you who were able to join us for the Féile last fall, we will again be at the spectacular Renaissance School of Arts & Sciences, just off Barbur Boulevard in inner Southwest Portland. Remember--bring comfy socks/slippers/house shoes!!!

This year's event will be organized slightly different from last year. Saturday’s classes will accommodate beginner and novice speakers, while Sunday’s classes will be tailored for continuing learners and intermediate speakers. Those interested in attending both days (either to dust of your language skills or to challenge your newly acquired skills) are welcome to enroll but please note that your skill level may not always be accommodated by the instructors.

The cost for Féile Portland is $50 for one day, and $85 for both days.
If you have questions, please feel free to contact Kimberly Goetz at kimberly@seannos.org. Schedule, instructor bios, language level rubric, food options, and on-line registration are available at http://www.seannos.org/portland-irish-fest/.

We hope you will join us and if you're unable to, please pass this information along to your networks and Irish language supporting friends! Thanks for supporting the Irish language here in the beautiful Pacific Northwest! We look forward to seeing you at the Féile in Portland!

Go raibh maith agat! Thanks for the tip. It turns out this is happening right in my neighborhood, just 8-10 blocks up the hill. Given that I can walk there and back, it seemed entirely stupid not to go. So I'm now registered for the novice classes on Saturday.

This (at least today's beginner/novice class) was a fun event, and it turned out the person sitting next to me also played the tin whistle (though neither of us was up to "session speed" yet... or ever!). We also talked about her Skype-ing twice a month with a Irish language tutor in Galway, which began to sound like a pretty smart option to keep my studies on track, particularly as there aren't schools around here offering any regular Irish language classes. I'm a self-motivated learner, but in need of feedback for sure.

Imelda taught our section, and she was an entertaining teacher as well as a very nice person. I said Hi to her from you, Redwolf-known-to-them-as-Audrey, and she mentioned having recently seeing you at a workshop in LA (and spoke well of you as a teacher ). However, I saw Brian's name on his tag and remembered that there was something I should be remembering to say or do about him, but all that came to mind was a lovely video I'd seen of him singing on Youtube, and then he turned out to be running around like a madman coordinating everything, and I never got to talk about him about anything but lunch.

In the end I came out the workshop with with a much better feeling for broad vs. slender consonants, and a humbling awareness that, having never actually spoken Irish to another human being, I was not very good at it at all. I overheard Brian talking about re-starting a conversation group he had led around here, which sounds like something I not only want, but need to participate in!

I overheard Brian talking about re-starting a conversation group he had led around here, which sounds like something I not only want, but need to participate in!

Hope that happened or happens in the future as a ciorcal comhrá is a great way for people to become comfortable with using the language , usually in a very friendly environment.