Irish music legends Christy Moore, Hozier, Lisa Hannigan and Sinead O’Connor have been immortalised on a new set of Irish Stamps released by An Post highlighting the many Irish artists who have graced stages at the famous Glastonbury Music and Arts Festival.
Designed by Dublin-based Shaughn McGrath Creative, the colourful large format stamps are available in a booklet of four national stamps (€4.40), at anpost.com/artists and all post offices.
A donation will be made for every stamp booklet sold to the Irish Music Industry Covid-19 Emergency Relief Fund, created to assist Irish music creators experiencing financial need.
To mark the launch of the new stamps, music fans across Ireland and the world are being invited to a virtual ‘festival’ of unique performances by the featured singer songwriters in Dublin’s GPO at 8pm this evening (Thursday July 15).
The virtual gig can be viewed here and for the next four weeks.
In addition to performances by Lisa Hannigan, Hozier and Christy Moore, Spoken Word artist Natalya O’Flaherty performs ‘3 Babies’, written by Sinead O Connor, in the 40 minute show.
We are delighted to bring you the virtual event of the year so far featuring Ireland’s finest Singer Song Writers 🎶 The GPO plays host to exclusive performances from Christy Moore, Hozier, and Lisa Hannigan so make sure to tune in tonight at https://t.co/hkso7qIOx9 at 8pm. pic.twitter.com/90wMTDZTBp
— An Post (@Postvox) July 15, 2021
Speaking during his performance in the GPO courtyard, Hozier said, “To be on an Irish stamp is such an honour and in such incredible company too.” Asked by presenter MayKay how he coped with the Covid-19 Lockdowns he said: ”By re-connecting with the sense of local community, people around me, walking, swimming in the sea, applying a sense of gratefulness to what I could engage with and what I could achieve, and I hope to take a lot of that with me.”
Also speaking at the GPO before performing in the main Post Office hall Christy Moore said he wished his grandparents were around to see him on a stamp and performing in the GPO: “To be invited here to sing is one of the great privileges of my working life.” Describing how he got through the Pandemic, he said: “It’s been difficult, we never really appreciated how well off we all were, in the work that we to do. There are good sides, I’ve had a full year at home which is something I’ve never had before. We won’t forget it in a hurry, this year that we’ve had”.
The new stamps are among the largest format stamps ever issued by An Post and the new stamps and a special First Day Cover envelope are available at all post offices and online at anpost.com/artists.
