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festivals · Friday 7 August 2026 · Various 
Clonmel Busking Festival
At Main streets and venues around Clonmel · Clonmel, Co. Tipperary
At Main streets and venues around Clonmel · Clonmel, Co. Tipperary
Every August, Clonmel hands its main streets over to buskers for a weekend, one of the longer-running free music events in Co. Tipperary. Organised by Simon Molloy since the early 2010s, the festival has grown from a single-day trial into a three-day fixture that draws performers from well beyond the town, with daytime street performances feeding into ticketless night-time gigs in the pubs and venues around Clonmel.
By day, musicians, singers and street performers set up along Clonmel’s main streets, with acts moving between pitches through the afternoon so there is always something new to come across on a walk through town. As evening sets in, the action shifts indoors: local pubs and venues host free concerts, historically drawing over a hundred acts across the weekend in the festival’s biggest years, ranging from well-known Irish names to musicians making a first appearance in the town. The format rewards wandering rather than planning: there is no single stage or ticketed area, so the best approach is to walk the town centre through the day and follow the music into whichever venue looks busiest after dark. Families are welcome for the daytime street sessions in particular.
Clonmel is the largest town in Co. Tipperary, on the N24 in the Suir valley, about 45 minutes from Waterford and just over two hours from Dublin via the M8. Clonmel has a train station on the Limerick Junction to Waterford line, and Bus Eireann connects the town with Cahir, Cashel, Waterford and Dublin. Street parking and public car parks serve the town centre, though spaces fill up on festival weekends.
Clonmel has a strong arts and pub scene year round, including the Junction Festival earlier in the summer, and the busking weekend is a good excuse to see the town at its liveliest. There is more to see in Clonmel and across Co. Tipperary.
Heading to Main streets and venues around Clonmel in Clonmel? Tipperary has plenty more to see. Read the Clonmel area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.