TOP TALENT: Ireland's newest traditional music group, Ciorras (COURTESY OF CIORRAS MANAGEMENT)

One of Ireland's leading literary lights, Emma Donoghue, the author of the Booker Prize-listed Room and a star attraction of the Beijing Irish Festival, talking about her own sold-out part of the program, said, "It somehow combined the intellectual sharpness of a late-night French talk show with the conviviality of an Irish pub." Inadvertently, her words summed up the whole festival.

Spread across a fortnight in March the festival took in various aspects of Ireland's diverse and rich cultural heritage, presenting them to a variety of Beijing audiences. It centered around Ireland's National Day, better known as St. Patrick's Day, which commemorates Ireland's patron saint, a man of great wisdom who reputedly set Ireland on a course of civilization and education.

The day itself was marked in Beijing by a reception at Ireland's Embassy hosted by the Ambassador Declan Kelleher, mingling the local Irish populace and embassy with Chinese VIPs sampling an array of refreshments; including the country's favorite black stout and Irish smoked salmon. The ambassador spent a deal of the function catching up with Chinese and Irish guests.

Culture infusion

WORLD CLASS: Sister and brother Irish folk dance duo Christy and Erin Jensen (COURTESY OF MIKE JENSEN)

On the art side of the program were mounted Hungry Mind, a collaborative Irish-Chinese installation exhibition in China Central Mall; and Convergence II, an exhibition of Irish and Chinese art in a variety of media, exploring the convergence of aesthetics by artists from opposite sides of the world, held in the Siemens Art Space in 798 District. Both events were successful and well attended, as was the invitation-only Irish evening later in the week at the National Center for the Performing Arts.

The main window on the festival was the concert held in the Forbidden City Concert Hall featuring Solo Celtic harp (clarsach) player Katie Targett-Adams, no stranger to Beijing.

In 2009 Targett-Adams wrote and recorded Day by Day in English and Mandarin to raise money and awareness for survivors of the Wenchuan earthquake in May 2008, and later played it for schoolchildren at the epicenter of the quake in southwest China's Sichuan Province as she donated more than 200 musical instruments and books to the relief fund.

What really mesmerizes the Chinese media are the brother-and-sister, 12- and 10-year-old dancers, Christy and Erin Jensen, who perform at a level far beyond their years. The footwork and coordination they show is astonishing, given it is the piece's premiere.

Christy says he likes living in Beijing. "It is definitely different from other countries we have lived in, but in a good way. I like my school here in Beijing. I meet lots of interesting people from all over the world and learn about Chinese culture."

The group Ciorras was put together for a hit TV program in Ireland, Lorg Lunny, carefully selected from among the country's most promising young musicians, "to present a new sound and vision in Irish music," says bodhran player Dermot Sheedy. The television experience for the band was "brilliant."