What's On in Armagh

For one weekend at the start of August, Armagh’s pubs, hotels and street corners fill with blues. The 7 Hills Blues Fest packs more than 40 gigs into 15 venues across the city, mixing intimate indoor sets with open-air street performances — and every one of them is free.

The 2026 line-up includes Crow Black Chicken, the Eric Bell Trio (led by the founding Thin Lizzy guitarist), Rob Strong and his band, Led Hedley, Villiers and the Villains and plenty more, so you can wander from venue to venue and catch several acts in an afternoon.

Saturday is the easiest day to bring the family: there is an artisan market at Shambles Yard from 1pm to 6pm, street food on Market Street from 11am to 5pm, and face painting, balloon art and a children’s treasure hunt in between the music. With everything free and walkable, it is a very low-effort festival to drop into.

Road bowls — hurling an iron bowl along winding country roads in as few throws as possible — survives as a serious sport in only a handful of Irish counties, and Armagh is its northern stronghold. Over this weekend the national governing body, Ból Chumann na hÉireann, brings its All-Ireland Series to Keady–Tassagh in south Armagh, with senior men, intermediate ladies, junior, veteran and under-16 boys’ grades all listed to compete.

It is a spectacle quite unlike anything else in Irish sport. Scores unfold along an open stretch of road rather than in a stadium, and the crowd walks with the players from throw to throw, so you experience the contest at hedge-height and close range.

Come prepared for a couple of hours on foot on rural roads, and check the Ból Chumann fixtures page for the weekend’s running order before travelling — throwing times and roads are confirmed closer to the event.

The Wickerman Gathering marks the ancient harvest festival of Lughnasa at Navan Fort, the great ceremonial mound just outside Armagh city that was once the seat of the kings of Ulster. Through the evening — it runs from 6.30pm to 10.30pm — there are living history performances, live music from local artists, artisan craft stalls and interactive family activities, and visitors are encouraged to come in Celtic-inspired costume.

The finale is the reason people keep coming back: a 30-foot wickerman is set ablaze in a fire ceremony honouring Lugh, the Celtic sun god, against the darkening sky over the fort.

Book ahead — tickets are sold in advance only and none are available on the evening, and they cannot be exchanged or refunded. There is no parking at the site itself; a mandatory park-and-ride operates from Armagh city, with accessible buses and disabled parking in the city centre for Blue Badge holders.

Founded in 1994, the Charles Wood Festival of Music has grown into one of Ireland’s premier choral events, filling Armagh’s main churches — including its two hilltop cathedrals — with a week of concerts, sung services, workshops and competitions each August. The festival honours Charles Wood, the Armagh-born composer of some of the best-loved music in the Anglican choral repertoire.

The 2026 edition is a special one: it marks 100 years since Wood’s death, and the centenary programme includes world-class performances and new commissions alongside the unveiling of the first permanent bust of the composer and the launch of a new biography by Professor Jeremy Dibble.

The festival draws singers, conductors and music lovers from across the UK, Ireland and beyond, but it is very accessible to casual visitors too — the programme mixes lunchtime and evening concerts with services sung by the Charles Wood Singers and Girls’ Choir, so it is easy to catch something whatever your day looks like. The full programme and tickets are on the festival website.

Armagh is the Orchard County, and this early-September weekend is when it shows off. Across four days, the Food & Cider Weekend serves up artisan bites and pop-up dining experiences, farm-to-fork feasts, immersive culinary trails, weekend markets and behind-the-scenes orchard tours, all in the region the tourist board bills as Northern Ireland’s Food Heartland.

The programme is a collection of individual events rather than a single site, spread between Armagh city and the working orchards and cider producers around it — one of the 2026 fixtures is the Armagh Food & Drink Experience, a ticketed afternoon showcase (£70) on the Saturday. Cider naturally features heavily, from tastings to orchard tours.

Events are priced and booked individually, so check the programme on the festival website and book the dining experiences and tours ahead rather than turning up on the day.

Slieve Gullion, the mountain at the heart of south Armagh’s Ring of Gullion, is steeped in myth — and at Halloween its forest park leans into that inheritance. Footsteps in the Forest turns the woodland into a week of lantern-lit trails with ghostly encounters, storytelling around fires, and live theatrical performances that bring the area’s legends and mythical creatures to life.

The festival is rooted in Samhain, the old Irish festival that Halloween grew out of, and the organisers pitch it as immersive storytelling rather than a jump-scare haunted trail — which makes it genuinely family-friendly. Around the performances there are interactive activities such as pumpkin carving, mask-making and fortune-telling, plus seasonal food and artisan treats.

Running over the week before Halloween, it is likely to be busy with families; check the Visit Mourne Gullion Strangford website for times and booking before travelling.

Armagh owes its handsome Georgian core to Archbishop Richard Robinson’s 18th-century building spree, and every November the city dresses that heritage up for a long festive weekend. Streets and historic venues fill with festive market stalls, costumed characters and family entertainment, and the festival doubles as the start of Armagh’s Christmas season.

Alongside the free street programme, 2026 brings a run of ticketed events with a Georgian twist — light shows, themed tours, a Highwayman’s Banquet, and mock trials staged in the old Armagh Courthouse. Full details of the artisan market and individual events are published on the festival page closer to the time.

Late November is cold, but that is half the atmosphere — wrap up and take it slowly around the Mall and the cathedral hills. If a particular ticketed event appeals, book when the programme goes live rather than waiting until the weekend itself.