About Earthsong The Earthsong Camp was birthed by John Bowker and Angie Pinson who were inspired by the Unicorn camps in England and wanted to bring a similar magic to Ireland. A space where we can spend a week in a private and wonderful setting working with beautiful music and teachings from the cultures of the world. Earth Song camp 2007 was the first of its kind here, and was a runaway success. John continues to oversee the camp together with a core group.

Living on the land In living simply on the land we gradually attune to the rhythms of the natural world and become more aware of the impact we are having on the environment. We learn to appreciate and respect the land, to feel part of it and then we naturally wish to seek out ways to minimise our footprint and tread lightly on the earth. Our aim is to have a camp that is as gentle and harmonious as possible, which involves leaving the land as we found it, respecting animal and plant life, recycling as much as we can, and also looking at ways we can offset our fuel consumption by lift sharing, communal cooking and donations to tree planting charities.

Spirituality At Earthsong we honour and respect all spiritual paths and beliefs, we are not affiliated to any particular belief system. Workshop leaders are encouraged to talk about possibilities rather than fact when dealing with spiritual ideas and we try to avoid Dogma. Through the experience of making music in a natural way, we can celebrate our connection to community and spirit.

Welcoming tears as well as laughter Many of the magical ingredients that made Earthsong what it was last year have come out of the Tribal Spirit gatherings that John Bowker has been leading for the past 10 years. As well as the heart opening and healing gifts from the spirit in singing, drumming and dancing there are other ways that enable us to feel safe, included and more in touch with ourselves. One of these seems to be that we have come to trust how completely normal and natural it is to cry as well as laugh when we need to. Once we know that tears are welcome we may find we shed healing tears as we listen to beautiful singing or receiving a friendly hug. We are clearly not ‘upset' about what is happening and can be pleased and relaxed about it. Listening wholeheartedly to each other, without judgment, advice or opinions is another thing that people have found very valuable at the Tribal Spirit gatherings. This can be can be helpful in your circle gatherings too. The core group in particular is an identifiable resource and will happily answer any questions you might have.

Article from Network magazine

This coming July an unusual event is taking place: the Earthsong Camp,

Tribal Spirit drum circle facilitator John Bowker, the events main co-ordinator explains a little about it :

I think I was a 'Glastonbury Groupie'. During the late seventies and early eighties I would head off every year with my rucksack and camp in the vale of Avalon, at the Pilton festival. When I first went there would have been around 20,000 people on site, it seemed enormous. I found the whole event mind blowing, not just because of the famous bands or psychoactive drugs. What excited me most was that the whole of the counter culture was there, alive and flourishing. Ably demonstrating new creative ways forward ; windmills, solar power, yoga, whole foods, organics, vegetarianism, C.N.D., new school initiatives, rare breeds, workers co-ops, tai chi. world music. It was inspiring and hopeful, suggesting the future could be good if we learnt a few things and gave up our destructive habits. And at Glastonbury the focus wasn't so much on the famous acts on the big stage, there was thousand and one wonderful musical and theatrical events happening all around you, which you could contribute to and become part of.

What I didn't like was the scary stuff ; the guys in balaclavas selling drugs, the heavy biker types drunk and dangerous. And I didn't like the incredible amounts of litter, or the impossibility of a decent nights sleep.

But there was another piece in the mind blowing jigsaw. The land. For a townie like myself, to be in the heart of the country for a few days, in the mystical heart of England, overlooked by the famous Glastonbury Tor. This had a profound effect on me, there was an enchantment that I couldn't explain or ignore, and my sceptical friends would, when I managed to drag them there from the city for the first time, eventually admit, ‘yes, there is something going on, a spooky wonderment, an Earth Vibe'. Spending time living on the land changed us, we began to care for our earth a little more.

In 1984 a visionary named Palden jenkins, who would later become well known as a new age author, would finally give up on the Glastonbury festival and its drug sodden hard cases and litter orgy and come up with a new model as a way of bringing the best and leaving behind the worst : The Camp scene was born with the first Glastonbury camps: I met him at one of Ireland's first camps, the Earth wisdom camp, Roscommon, 1993. He explained his ideas, how a group of people can come together for a while, living on the land, sharing responsibilities for that community and the land, and sharing skills and creative ways and teachings, creating a safe private environment for exploration of what it can mean to be a modern healthy human, an exploration of freedom.

The U.K. camp scene has blossomed since the eighties, evolving quickly from the rock and pop festivals into a much safer and family friendly environment. For many years now I have been involved with Unicorn Camps, which themselves evolved directly from the earlier Glastonbury camps. Clear policies help create a healing oasis ; no drugs or alcohol, no electric music, no late night noise, no dogs, no day tickets. Wonderful workshops cover music and dance, crafts, personal growth. Workshops crafts and games are  provided for children and teenagers all on a Beautiful enchanted site. Excellent covered spaces give shelter from the weather.  I teach drumming and voice at the camp, as I do in Ireland and over the years some of my Irish friends and students have made the long and arduous journey. They were amazed at what was possible in a field in Dorset, at the care and attention that went into getting the event just right for healthy humans. but one big problem is that it was over there, not over here.

Around ten years ago Angie Pinson, my long term friend and partner and I ran a couple of camps in Clare. very small and intimate, wonderfully magical, the camps finished when we lost the lease of the farm we were renting. Since then the perfect site has been almost impossible to find, and there were sorry tales; a ‘rainbow camp'( primarily a young peoples camp) being stopped by Clare locals with shotguns. the Frog Fayre in Cork, half festival half camp, ran courageously and outrageously  for a few years but ground to a halt with a few unsolved problems a couple of years ago. A few other nice events came and went, often just for a day or a weekend, but nothing appeared with the clarity and wisdom of the Unicorn camps.

Then in  autumn 06 a site came up. One of my drummers had 10 acres in Roscommon, very private, good flat camping land. I checked it out, it was a bit small but very do-able.

I spoke to a few of my friends and colleagues in the community voice and drum scene and we felt it was time. We ‘pressed go'. We could run a camp based on the Unicorn model for around 100 adults and maybe 50 or so teenagers and children on that site.

Amazing offers of wonderful workshops flooded in immediately from teachers involved with the tribal spirit drum/dance/song community ; yoga, voice, dance, drum, crafts, chi kong....

There then started a search for ; a big top (none for hire in Ireland, have to buy one new? 22,000 Euros!!! What about second hand ? hard to find but I put a deposit on a 10,000 Euro second hand big top) Then : a marquee or two for other adult workshops, and a venue for children's workshops, one for the teenagers, a wood fired shower system including a stove, and copper cylinders and all the plumbing, firewood, a venue for a shower tent, 22 kerosene lamps, 15 compost buckets, 8 nice clean loo cubicles, 8 nice clean loo seats, 6 stand taps and piping for water,  5 wheelbarrows, 4 fire barrels, 3 fire extinguishers,2 big plastic splash pools for chill out on hot days, one massive trailer to move the big top around and a poster or two on a pear tree ...

A big bill started to loom, way over the 100 ticket sale budget. It became apparent a larger site would be needed if we were to avoid going into debt. I spoke to a few drummers who had come on board to help organise the event and we agreed we could just about manage to stretch to 150 adult tickets for this site this year,  but a larger site would be lovely for next time. I remember saying to one colleague ‘perhaps one of the drummers (at the retreats we run) will tell me they have a nice big farm that would do for next year'.

Three days later at the next drum retreat one of the drummers came up to me. ‘ I have a nice big farm that would do for next years camp, if you're ever thinking of moving sites', she said. Two days later I was standing on a most beautiful and magical fairy fort in the middle of a wonderful 250 acre organic farm in Westmeath. Around me were mature Beech and Ash trees and fairy thorns. Two other fairy forts in the next field, also part of the farm. A stream trickled by and birdies tweeted. All was totally private and enchanted. Can we use it for this year? I asked.