Shannon

Shannon Musical Society  is still celebrating its most successful haul of trophies in 21 years, after capturing six awards at the “musical Oscars”. Members came home from the Association of Irish Musical Societies (AIMS) with awards, with arms full of trophies last weekend. More than 1,100 people attended the glittering awards ceremony in Killarney’s INEC at the weekend. The most coveted award is for Best Overall Show and Shannon were delighted to receive second place, against stiff competition. The last time they were nominated for this award was in 2006, for The Wiz. Prior to that, it was for The Hot Mikado in 2000. The society was nominated for six awards after its production of Jesus Christ Superstar, which was staged last February. These included nominations for Best Front of House, Best Ensemble, Best Director, Best Overall Show, Best Visuals and Best Technical. SMS has won many awards over the years but not since 1993 has it been nominated for …

Two Clare restaurants took home top regional accolades from the Irish Restaurant Awards 2014. The Dining Room at Gregan’s Castle, Ballyvaughan was named best hotel restaurant in Munster while best customer service in the province was deemed to be in Earl of Thomond at Dromoland Castle Hotel. Kilkenny Restaurant Campagne took home the prize of Best Restaurant in Ireland and Neven Maguire, Head Chef of MacNean House and Restaurant, was crowned Best Chef in Ireland at the Irish Restaurant Awards 2014 in association with the Sunday Independent LIFE Magazine, on Monday. Over 900 restaurateurs and industry players turned out to attend Ireland’s biggest ever restaurant awards where regional and All-Ireland winners were announced. Pádraic Óg Gallagher, President of the Restaurants Association of Ireland said: “This year’s awards have been the biggest, brightest- and the best. They are the awards everyone wants to be associated with, and everyone wants to be a winner. As a testament to their success, we’ve seen …

PUPILS from St Tola’s Primary Schools in Shannon and Tubber National School in The Burren learned about Kenyan tribal life from a  Maasai warrior this wek. For four years school-to-school connections have been established through the Becomeafriend.net project between Irish schools and traditional Maasai schools in Kenya. The children and teachers have been sharing information about their lives, culture, wildlife, health, creativity and passtimes with primary schools and on Tuesday Timothy Ole Mosiany visited the  two Clare schools to give pupils a first hand account of life in his tribe. During the visit to Shannon and Tubber, he talked with pupils from junior and senior cycles, who found out more about life back in Kenya and how it compares with their own. Timothy said, “I’ve had a wonderful experiences in all the schools here, the children are so bright and so welcoming.” The children treated Timothy to wonderful singing and dancing and he taught them how to do the world …

  THE first permanent extension since the initial construction of St Aidan’s School in Shannon has been opened for some weeks and was recently blessed by the Bishop of Killaloe Kieran O’Reilly. The new extension to the school consists of a main stream classroom, two resource rooms, staff toilets and an extended car park. Speaking this week, school principal Patrice Hayes said; “We had it blessed following the confirmation ceremony, it was a good opportunity for the Bishop who was confirming the children to bless it on the same day. The children actually moved into it in April. We only applied for it in September 2012 and it was ongoing all of last year.” She said that putting the extension in place had been quite a big project; “It’s one 80 metres squared classroom, a resource room, staff toilets and we also redesigned our existing car park. There was a lot of work.” The school is going to have a …

Councillor John Crowe of Sixmilebridge was elected Mayor of Clare at the county council AGM held on this Friday afternoon. Councillor Crowe was nominated by poll topper Joe Cooney and seconded by Independent Gerry Flynn. The Fine Gael councillor is the county’s outgoing deputy mayor. Councillor Crowe will  be the only Fine Gael member to hold the position of mayor over the five-year term of the new authority. Two Fianna Fáil  members will have the honour of holding office, while the “technical group”, consisting of the seven Independents and one Sinn Féin, will also have two terms of office. Fianna Fáil’s Councillor Tony O’ Brien of the Killaloe Electoral area was elected deputy mayor for the coming year. Councillor O’Brien was re-elected to the council last month having lost his seat in the 2009 local election. Mayor Crowe paid tribute to the councillors who lost their seats and who retired. He said he was “delighted to be part of a power-sharing agreement …

AN application has been submitted to Clare County Council seeking an extension of planning permission for a significant residential development at Tullyvarraga in Shannon. The application has been made by Jim Woods Building Contractor Ltd who is seeking an extension of planning granted in 2009 for the construction of 33 houses. The houses would consist of two blocks of five town houses, two blocks of four town houses, one block of three town houses, four blocks of semi-detached houses and five detached houses. There would also be one four-storey apartment block, with 38 apartments included. Of these 27 would be two beds, three would be one bed, four would be three beds and there are also be four two bed penthouses. It is also proposed that parking for 55 cars would be included for the apartment block. The application for an extension of planning permission claims that there is local demand for housing once again. “The site is serviced and …

ST Caimin’s Community School Shannon will have a new principal from the start of September, with Claire Knight taking over from John Cleary. Ms Knight has been at St Caimin’s since 1985, has taught PE and maths and served as deputy principal for the last five years, a role she enjoyed. “I learned an awful lot from the experience and I enjoyed working with the students, their parents and the teachers.” Of her new position, she says, “We’re in a very good place now to bring people forward with all the changes that are coming in education. The central theme for us is our mission statement that we have an environment that is structured and that students feel cared for and safe.” She has seen huge changes in the school over the course of her lengthy career. “We started off that first year with 112 students, then we brought them in one year at a time. It was initially built …

Shannon Musical Society has been nominated for six national awards for its recent stage production of Jesus Christ Superstar. The society hasn’t had so many nominations for the Association of Irish Musical Societies (AIMS) awards since 1993, when they presented Half a Sixpence to the Shannon audiences. This year, the Shannon group has been nominated for best overall show, against stiff competition from around the country. The last time they were nominated for this award, it was for their production of The Wiz in 2006 and, prior to that, they were nominated for Hot Mikado in 2000. That show was directed by twins Sean and Brian Power. This year, Sean Power stepped out of the family partnership and directed on his own for the first time and he was delighted to be nominated in the best director category. The Shannon group has also been nominated for best visuals. This award encompasses costumes, props, hair and make-up. Jesus Christ Superstar relies …