The Philadelphia Ceili Group needs your help.

Founded by Irish immigrants and Irish-Americans 66 years ago, the Philadelphia Ceili Group, a 501c3 nonprofit, has been dedicated to preserving Irish culture in America from Brigid’s Cross-making workshops to Irish language lessons, from concerts, monthly ceili dances, music sessions and theater, to an annual festival celebrating Irish traditional music and dance.

The Ceili Group’s annual Festival of Traditional Irish Music and Dance, the longest running traditional Irish music festival in the US, turns 50 this year. We’d love this year’s event to be special, but two years of pandemic isolation meant that our usual source of revenue—dances and concerts—dried up and even our festival went virtual. As it turns out, festivals on Zoom just aren’t the same! The show went on, but the audiences didn’t show up in enough numbers to pay the bills.

We’re going into our 50^th year with a shortfall so we are launching an unprecedented multi-pronged campaign to raise $25,000 for the three-day festival, scheduled for October 10-12 at the Commodore Barry Arts and Culture Center, The Irish Center.

Our relationship with the Irish Center is close. We share a 1958 birthday and it’s our home. More than that, PCG events bring the Center thousands of dollars of revenue a year—more than $3,000 during the festival alone--mainly in sales of food and beverages. Our events also help the Irish Center fulfill its nonprofit mission to be a hub of Irish arts and entertainment. Your tax deductible donation to our festival campaign will help us both.

Any donation, small or large, can help make sure the show goes on. Gifts of $250 or more can make you a festival sponsor with your name posted prominently on all our signage, social media, on screens at the festival itself and on the festival portion of our website. Gifts of $500 and more will, along with festival sponsorship and its benefits, give you a year-long shoutout out on the PCG website. Other levels of donations have various benefits, including your name as the leading sponsor of one of the three days of the event. Donate here make your secure donation . Checks may be sent to The Philadelphia Ceili Group, 7715 Crittenden Street, #387, Philadelphia, PA 19118-4421,

Some of the finest Irish traditional musicians have appeared on stage during the festival. The event is considered of such significance that recordings of the festival are now part of Villanova University’s Digital Library, a storehouse for Philadelphia’s Irish history.

Being part of history is flattering, but we don’t want to be just history.

We hope you agree that this unique cultural treasure is something worth fighting for.

Help us keep the music playing.

Thank you!

50th Annual PCG Irish Traditional Music & Dance Festival

By Philadelphia Ceili Group

50th Annual PCG Irish Traditional Music & Dance Festival

Our Legacy, Our Future