Imelda May Instagram – I’m honoured to be the special finale event for Ireland’s inaugural YES Festival. YES, inspired by James Joyce’s final episode XVIII (Penelope) in his epic novel Ulysses – commonly celebrated as Molly’s Soliloquy – is Ireland’s inaugural all-women artists event and the grand-finale weekend of a 2 year European journey that will have taken place across 18 European cities to mark the centenary of the publication of Ulysses in Paris 1922 – ULYSSES European Odyssey (UEO) 2022-2024 (www.ulysseseurope.eu). The Ulyssean odyssey began in Athens September 2022 and has zig-zagged from Oulu in the arctic circle to Lisbon on the Iberian Peninsula, from Istanbul in the east to Leeuwarden in the Netherlands, from Lugo, the food capital of Galicia, to Vilnius in Lithuania, and now concludes back in the north west of Ireland. ‘YES: The Future A Female Vision’ will take place across 4 days featuring 40 events in Derry & north-east Donegal with appearances from over 30 women artists coming from the 16 nations of the ULYSSES European Odyssey project who will be joined by Irish & British women artists in an extraordinarily diverse range of events – dance, music, film, public art and spectacle, visual art, literature, street arts and street food and high level conversational debates. Many of them free to attend! I will be closing the festival at the Millenium Forum in Derry on Sunday 16th June – discussing with Aoife Barry my own explorations and love of Joyce, my songwriting and debut poetry collection A Lick and A Promise, as well as performing an acoustic set of songs and poetry. Come and join us & the celebrations! More info about the festival https://www.yesderry.com and tickets available https://www.millenniumforum.co.uk/shows/imelda-may/ @yesderry #MollyBloomsday #yesDerry #JamesJoyce #Ulysses