Wexford Spiegeltent Festival is the best little festival in Ireland

The Wexford festival also managed to win ‘Tech Crew of the Year’ seeing off stiff competition from other festivals and venues from all over the country.

The shortlist for the IMRO awards was compiled by over 19,000 members of IMRO. Nominees were assessed by Ireland's musicians, songwriters, composers and publishers on a number of criteria including general ambience, staging, sound, lighting, diversity of music, artist relations and promotion.

Having celebrated a ten successful years of The Wexford Spiegeltent Festival last year, organiser Brian Byrne of Lantern and his crew were over the moon to be recognised. It’s the second time that they’ve been recognised as ‘Small Festival of the Year’.

“It means a lot to get this recognition from IMRO," Brian said. “We have a great bunch of people who work hard to create a very special Festival every year and these awards acknowledge the contribution made by everyone.

"Such acknowledgement is very motivating to continue to bring the best shows and performers we can to Wexford and to give our audiences the best experience possible.

Brian was also delighted to see the efforts of the dedicated festival crew recognised.

“I was especially pleased that our Tech Crew won,” he said. “These are the guys who are in the venue long before the show starts, and are still working on the stage long after the shows are over and the audience are gone. They’re rarely noticed but they are absolutely vital to every show that we do and deserve all the recognition.”

The Waterboys have been announced as the first act for this year's Spiegeltent Festival, adding a second show (November 1) to their sold out November 2nd show.

Further line-up announcements are imminent as the Spiegeltent crew seek to live up their reputation as the best small festival in the country.