Entertainment
Festival -Saturday June 14, 2025
- Axe Throwing
Musician Jam Tent: Guitars, Ukeleles, fiddles, Bodran, Dulcimers, tamborines, spoons, and wind instruments!. Singers Welcome
Honored Clan 2025 – Hay
Tartan Searches tent – stop by and give your family information – you might have a clan! Children are encouraged to see what a clan is and put their tag on boy or girl figure.
Jamestown Pipes and Drums
The featured bagpipe band again this year will be the award-winning Jamestown Pipes and Drums from Jamestown, NC. The band is led by Pipe Major Eric Sparklin and Drum Sargent Robert Monroe. Jamestown Pipes and Drums compete in the Eastern United States Pipe Band Association (EUSPBA) competitions in the southeast. For more information, please see their website,
Sheep Herding Demonstrations
Sheep herding is an important part of Scottish history and culture. Sheep herding in Scotland may have started as far back as 4,000-5,000 years ago not only to produce meat, but also to produce additional products such as milk and wool. Specially trained sheep dogs are very commonplace in Scotland where the use of such dogs goes back to the 19th century. Come and watch live demonstrations of the art of sheep herding using border collies, or as the Scots call them, tykes.
Tuatha Dea
Tuatha Dea is a little bit different than other Celtic Bands. Think Appalachian/Celtic. Not quite sure what to make of that? You have to hear it to understand it! With the band’s Celtic heritage as an underpinning, this group takes Irish and Scottish music and makes their own blend of it with rock. Appalachian blues, and a sprinkling of mountain drumming. It is completely unique and very compelling. The band’s name is actually an Old Irish phrase that means “children of the Gods”, which you may or may not already know.
Will MacMorran
Will MacMorran is a multi-talented musician, audio engineer, and educator based in Johnson City, TN. Will has had the honor of touring with The Chieftains as their guitar player during their last 4 years of touring and has spent 15 years touring nationally and internationally with well-known artists in the Celtic, pop, and country genres. Will started piping at a young age and quickly added the guitar, whistles, accordion, and bouzouki, among other instruments, to his skillset. Will currently teaches as an adjunct in East Tennessee State University’s Bluegrass, Old Time, and Roots Music Studies Program and is the Department Head of Entertainment Technology at Northeast State Community College.
Presented by the Arts Council of Macon County
The Jacobites By Name
“The Jacobites By Name” based in Nashville TN, specialize in Scottish music often in the original Scots language that educates while entertaining. Our approach is unique in that we learn and share the history of the songs and we never Anglicize Scots music. The songs we perform span the last 7 centuries. With more than 20 years in music as a band director and Director of Music Ministry, George James is featured on guitar and vocals. Having hosted his own Celtic and Folk radio show in West Tennessee, Nathan James gives the history behind each song and joins on whistles, pipes and vocals. Our newest member, Ryan Driber, joins us on the mandolin, 4 string banjo and bouzouki.
Andrew “Finn” McGill
North Carolina-native violinist/fiddler Andrew Finn Magill grew up studying traditional Irish music, oldtime, bluegrass and swing every summer with the best fiddlers in the world at the Swannanoa Gathering. He is a Fulbright Fellow, South Arts Emerging Traditional Artist, North Carolina Arts Council Fellow, All-Ireland fiddle finalist, and signed to Ropeadope records.
He has been featured on PBS, MTV-U, TEDx, and multiple times on NPR. His 2016 album, “Roots” debuted at number #46 on the folk DJ charts, and he has performed with artists including John Doyle, Rising Appalachia, Trio Brasileiro, and many others. His touring projects include a duo with Irish singer/multi-instrumentalist Dave Curley, a duo with Scottish guitarist/bouzouki-player Alan Murray, Merlefest songwriting-winner Anya Hinkle, and various other projects as a side-man and featured soloist. Finn also tours the country as a guest lecturer at universities presenting his interactive performance/lecture “The Evolution of Irish and Scottish fiddle traditions in the Appalachian Mountains.”
Presented by the Arts Council of Macon County
“Everybody has a little Scottish in them somewhere!”