Irish Times critics review Billy Foley at the Fenton Gallery in Cork the National Youth SO of Ireland at the National Concert Hall in Dublin and Canzona at St Ann's Church also in Dublin.
Billy Foley
Fenton Gallery, Cork
This exhibition of paintings by Billy Foley is deceptively simple; in as much as the initial impression is one of an explosion of creativity, where rapid flourishes of the brush zipped over the canvas as if it were a hotplate. This is borne out by the way in which certain pieces allow substantial amounts of blank canvas to dominate the compositions. In actuality, these works are a reaction to the more substantially worked pieces where the surface underwent significant revision through denser layers of paint and use of line.
The entire display, however, has a cohesion shown through a unified colour palette consisting of grey, black, brown, blue and the ubiquitous white of canvas. And while form materialises occasionally, it is the primacy of line and how it convolutes and intertwines in a free-flowing way which characterises Foley's abstraction.
The energy embodied in these paintings is not just indicative of the artist's expressive mark-making prowess, as the conceptual driving force is fuelled by an interest in the attributes of science - in particular, the influence of Chaos Theory and principles of particle physics. These paintings then come to symbolise for Foley an extension of the very elements which make up the universe, with the artist being both a metaphorical and physical conduit for this flow.
• Runs until February 12th
Mark Ewart
National Youth SO of Ireland/Anissimov
NCH, Dublin
Barber - Adagio. Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No 1. Symphony No 6 (Pathétique)
The National Youth Symphony Orchestra of Ireland's annual New Year appearance in Dublin didn't materialise this year, as the orchestra instead gave an exclusive concert in the early days of Cork celebrations as European City of Culture. But the orchestra did perform in Dublin in January - at the National Concert Hall on Sunday, for a well-supported Memorial and Benefit Concert for Beslan, Remembering the School Children, presented by the Ireland Russia Association.
Samuel Barber's Adagio for strings, which opened the programme, has long had memorial associations, and the sense of lamentation and farewell is explicit in the Finale of Tchaikovsky's Pathétique Symphony.
The temperature of the evening was raised through the speech by the Ireland Russia Association's joint president, Colin Goggin, conjuring up images so vivid that, were they available on video, I doubt they would make it uncensored onto our television screens, and bringing two youthful survivors from Beslan School No. 1 onto the stage of the National Concert Hall.
The NYSOI's playing was understandably charged, the opening Barber in a hold-your-breath kind of way as well as with more freely flowing emotion, the Tchaikovsky with clearer and more consistent thrust.
There were moments of wonderful colouring in the Barber, and Anissimov's unhurried tempos in the Tchaikovsky symphony served to clarify the strength of statement he was after, although it certainly gave its fair share of problems to the players.
The orchestra was not making music with as balanced and consistently confident a voice as it has in recent years, and one could be forgiven for wondering if the sheer sense of occasion on Sunday actually served to undermine the young players in some way.
The same question might be asked about Sasha Anissimov, the soloist in Tchaikovsky's First Piano Concerto (and son of the conductor), whose clear ideas and careful pacing didn't always enable him to keep the music strictly on the rails. Anissimov senior was a tower of strength here, negotiating a steady collaborative path that otherwise might not have existed.
Michael Dervan
Canzona, OSC/Murphy
St Ann's Church, Dawson Street, Dublin
Bach - Cantatas 175, 117, 7
The second of this year's cantata concerts in St Ann's opened with cantata no. 175, Er rufet seinen Schafen mit namen. The second movement alto aria, which dwells on the pastoral allegory of God as shepherd, was an early highlight, with Alison Browner's clear, narrative singing nicely coloured by a delicately-textured trio of obbligato flutes.
Bass Jeffrey Ledwidge is a relative newcomer to the series. Although sometimes slightly tentative, he revealed a considerable expressive range, for example a subtly commanding authority in the aria "Open up, you ears, both!", but also moments of tenderness elsewhere in the programme.
The 20-voice Canzona Chamber Choir makes a controlled and well-blended but bright, transparent sound that suits this music so well.
Cantata No. 7 - Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (or Christ our Lord came to the Jordan) - was written for the feast of John the Baptist in June 1724. It is rich in musical illustration, with the water of the river Jordan easy to imagine in the gentle instrumental inter-play of the opening movement - one of Bach's great chorale fantasias - and the Holy Spirit suggested by the fluttering violin duo in the tenor aria, in which Robin Tritschler showed considerable declamatory strength.
In the alto aria, Alison Browner was well-matched to the beautiful, plaintively persuasive music which rather deceptively packages the divisive and quintessential Lutheran argument that no amount of good works can get you into heaven, but rather faith alone. Here and elsewhere - for example in the lilting opening chorus of cantata no. 117, Sei Lob und Her dem höchstein Gut - conductor Blanaid Murphy was more demanding of the Orchestra of St Cecilia than in last week's concert. She secured balance, both within the ensemble and in accompanying the choir and soloists, and cohesion, and even the occasional period-style bloom from the modern strings.
Michael Dungan
