This August Bank Holiday sees the inaugural EMERGE Music Festival. Talking place in Belfast for the first time on Saturday 27th & Sunday 28th August, a show-stopping lineup of over 40 acts are due to perform for what looks set to be one of the event’s of the year.
The 2-day spectacle is brought to you by two of Northern Ireland’s mainstay brands; Shine Club and Belsonic Festival. No stranger to throwing large scale shows with the leading names in dance music, Shine has previously welcomed the likes of Fatboy Slim, Charlotte De Witte, BICEP, and Amelie Lens among many others to their renowned venue. Meanwhile Belsonic usher in heavyweights from across a variety of genres year on year to their annual festival such as The Chemical Brothers, Above & Beyond, MK, Tiesto and more. After EMERGE’s debut at last year’s Belsonic festival, their dream team pairing with Shine has now produced the biggest event of its kind to happen in Ireland, with 20,000 people set to attend each day.
Running from 4pm-11pm on both days, the multistage outdoor event will be held in Boucher Road Playing Fields. The council owned premises is used throughout the year for musical concerts and performances, as well as housing sport pitches for locals residents. The site is easily accessible via public transport, foot or car.
If you’re driving from the city centre to the festival it will take around 10 minutes to get there. For those coming via train the closest station is Adelaide Station, which is a 15/20 minute walk from the site. The last train from Adelaide back to the Botanic/city centre leaves at 11.24pm. Buses can also be taken from the city centre with the 9A /9B or 9E service running until 11:12pm, bringing you less than a 10 minute walk from the festival site.
Once inside, ravers will be greeted by a multitude of cutting edge stage designs kitted out with world class sound systems and immersive production. Setting up camp on these stages throughout the day are some of the most in-demand and sought after names across house, techno, tech house and beyond. Day one on the Saturday brings progressive house king Eric Prydz who tops the bill with fan favourite Peggy Gou and tech house titan Michael Bibi.
Playing alongside will see Eric Prydz’s protege Cristoph, techno’s coolest duo Fjaak, the shapeshifting Special Request, Drumcode regulars Dense & Pika as well as many more kicking the festival off to a flying start. Moving into Sunday finds house royalty Disclosure as well as Trick label boss Patrick Topping landing in Belfast. They’re joined by Steel City Dance Discs’ head honcho Mall Grab and Ireland’s very own KETTAMA. Other big names set to perform include DJ Seinfield, Dusky, Rebekah, BLK and plenty more.
Speaking about the upcoming festival, Alan Simms, Co-Promoter and Director of EMERGE Music Festival, said:
“The electronic music scene is one that has grown steadily in Belfast over the 30-odd years that I’ve been promoting in the city with my Shine brand, and it’s grown exponentially over the last few years. Belfast is one of the most fertile and dynamic scenes of its kind in the UK or Ireland.
We’ve promoted many large scale outdoor electronic events in recent years but always wanted to do a huge multistage event of this kind. Feedback from our audience suggested that a huge appetite exists for a unique production of this kind in Northern Ireland. We’re lucky to have some of the world’s biggest names in dance music on our inaugural line-up of EMERGE Music Festival, most of whom we’ve been working with since their very first club shows in the country.”
Tickets are running low, for more info and to seal your place to this history-making event head here.
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