SUNDAY 27
Bach to Beethoven
NCH Kevin Barry Recital Room, Dublin 3pm €17.50 nch.ie
Cellist Gerald Peregrine and pianist Fiachra Garvey are presenting three concerts for the National Concert Hall's Chamber Music Series. The focus is on Bach and Beethoven – the three viola da gamba sonatas by Bach, and the cello sonatas and sets of variations by Beethoven. The opening programme offers Bach's Sonata in G, BWV1027, the two sonatas of Beethoven's Op 5, and the composer's earlier set of variations on Handel's See the Conqu'ring Hero Comes. The series continues on Sunday, February 24th, and concludes on Sunday, March 31st.
THURSDAY 31
Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition grand final
NCH, Dublin 7.30pm €15-€35 nch.ie
The Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition, which began last Friday, has been working its way through the multiple daily sessions of the piano-accompanied preliminary rounds (NCH Studio, Saturday and Sunday) and semi-finals (Monday and Tuesday). These finals present the singers in the company of the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra under Laurent Wagner, former principal conductor of the RTÉ Concert Orchestra. An international jury will attempt to separate the stars of the future from the promising singers of the present.
FRIDAY 1
RTÉ NSO/David Brophy
NCH, Dublin 7.30pm €15-€25 nch.ie
One of the innovations of the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra's current season is the inclusion of a number of all-Irish programmes under the banner Towards 2022. It's basically a loose extension of the kinds of programmes that featured in the 2016 festival Composing the Island. The 2022 focus is very vague, with the first programme having English composer Vaughan Williams's 1910 Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis jostling with AJ Potter's 1968 Sinfonia "de Profundis", which was first performed in 1969. The latest offering also seems to have been conceived with a very loose connection to 2022. David Brophy conducts Stanford's 1903 Irish Rhapsody No 2 (Lament for the Son of Ossian), John Buckley's 1992 Organ Concerto with Fergal Caulfield as soloist, and Ina Boyle's 1927 Symphony No 1 (Glencree).
