Dance and classical music feature in today's reviews as Michael Seaver sees Summerspace Masrtin Adams listens to tenor Eamonn Mulhall accompanied by Mairéad Hurley on piano.

Summerspace

BIPED

Merce Cunningham Dance Co

it's hard to believe in all of the coincidences that occur during a performance by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Cunningham famously believes in chance and allows all of the theatrical elements to co-exist rather than co-depend. An arm might sway at the exact time as a sweeping lighting change or a precise suspension in movement match a similar hiatus in the music, but these are all just happy coincidences, and there were many at Wednesday's performance at the Abbey, for the opening night of the International Dance Festival Ireland.

Summerspace is an early work and introduces some of the essentials in Cunningham's work such as a striking visual setting, a significant music score and his own movement vocabulary; upright bodies, chests thrust forward and arms floating out to the side. The matching pointillist backdrop and costumes by Robert Rauschenberg is mirrored in the softly splashing notes and chords in Morton Feldman's music. The six dancers are in constant motion in groups or alone, and even a pose will defy stillness through wriggling fingers or a twitching leg. The overall effect is not of relentlessness but rather an almost hypnotic calmness that beguiles the viewer. The texture of moving décor is added in BIPED, as we view the movement through hazy gauze that screens video images by Paul Kaiser and Shelly Eshkar. Here the movements are more taut and bound, arms held further back and chests more forcibly directing motion. The lightness of Summerspace is gone and elevations and jumps struggle to leave the ground, dragged down by the constantly shifting light squares on the floor. The dark mood accentuates certain moments like the six men sweeping on-stage carrying costumes, which they put onto each female dancer in one swift movement.

Within the context of the piece, such a simple human interaction is strangely touching. Later, a lone woman hovers downstage, rapidly hopping from one straight leg to another, before being whisked to the air by three men, released from her confinement. It's the wonderful illogicality in form and movement that reveals Cunningham's genius. Nothing is prescriptive and ending each piece with the curtain closing on the dancers still performing is probably the only way to send us home, otherwise we'd watch the dance all night.

International Dance Festival Ireland, until May 26th. Bookings: 01-6790524/

[ www.dancefestivalireland.ieOpens in new window ]

Michael Seaver

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Eamonn Mulhall (tenor)/Mairéad Hurley (piano)

Bank of Ireland Arts Centre

Mulhall has the sort of tenor voice which commands attention. His tone is strong, clear and unforced; vibrato is light and unobtrusive; his range of volume is wide. Few could have any doubts that this 24-year-old has a secure future as a singer.

In September, he takes up a scholarship at the Royal College of Music. That might prove an opportunity to deal with some of the stylistic and technical limitations shown in his recital at the Bank of Ireland Arts Centre last Wednesday lunchtime.

German and French songs were grouped together, between opening and closing English groups - a neat arrangement which highlighted how much better Mulhall was in some areas than others. Schubert's Stándchen and Ganymed were cool, almost detached, and that impression was reinforced by a passionless stage manner.

Beneath that general quality lay the specific problem of how to deal with the text. Mulhall's line-driven style of singing seemed unable to accommodate the declamatory tensions of Schubert, or of Purcell's Music for a While. Yet in English songs conceived in a line-driven way, such as Quilter's Go Lovely Rose, things were better. Even so, the most impressive performances by far were of French music. Eamonn Mulhall seemed to understand the fastidious perfection of Duparc's Chanson triste, and the simple melodiousness of Fauré's Lydia. Throughout the recital, his sound was always good to listen to; but in these pieces more than in any others, he got to the heart of the music.

Martin Adams