It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in this Tipperary town

Despite it being a miserable wet, November evening, hundreds of people turned up in Nenagh last Sunday for the switching on of the town’s Christmas lights.

There was a real festival atmosphere around the town with part of Pearse Street cordoned off for a mini-festival that included the tops of local talent such as Lisa Manning, Trudi Lalor, Bubba Shakespeare, the Emma Fitzgerald Group, Martin “The Freshman” Ryan, Glór Tíre’s Tex Deegan, Martin Grace, Michelle Hennessy and the Hennessy School of Music, Yvonne Richardson, Ormond Comhaltas and Jack and Caitlín McGrath. Also taking part were The Urge.

DJ JP O’Meara kept the crowd moving with his eclectic mixture of Christmas dance tunes, and even found time to pit the girls and boys and mums and dads against each other in dancing showdowns.

With the rain easing, Santa turned up in person to help Trudi and Tom Bán of RTE1’s Bush Kids programme, to switch on the colourful display to the “oohs” and “aahs” of the crowd.

The Cathaoirleach of Nenagh Municipal District Council, Cllr Hughie McGrath welcomed everybody to the event and urged people to shop local during the Christmas period.

Next up is a Christmas market on Banba Square on December 10, which is being run by the tourist office and arts centre.