Festive Overture - John Kinsella
Duiseacht - Donal Lunny
Earlsfort Suite - Seoirse Bodley
The Brendan Voyage - Shaun Davey
The opening and closing works of this concert were John Kinsella's Festive Overture, written in 1995 to celebrate 70 years of Irish broadcasting, and Shaun Davey's The Brendan Voyage. In the latter, Liam O'Flynn was the superb soloist on uilleann pipes. Between these came the Irish premiere of Donal Lunny's Duiseacht, commissioned for EXPO 2000, and the first performance of Seoirse Bodley's Earlsfort Suite, commissioned by Duchas to celebrate the NCH.
Earlsfort Suite sets three poems specially written by Michael O'Siadhail. The music's harmonic and melodic styles, and its feel for declamatory vocal lines, deftly capture the poetry's evocations of the NCH's past and present. The piece avoids superficial depiction, yet is accessible. Bernadette Greevy (mezzosoprano) was the authoritative soloist.
Duiseacht is scored for full orchestra plus two percussion soloists (Lloyd Byrne and Greg Sheehan) and bodhran (the composer). It puts ideas derived from folk music into orchestral dress, and as in The Brendan Voyage, the attempt to achieve length using brief, closed material, raises fundamental issues.
Duiseacht spices up the language of Sean O Riada's music for Mise Eire, and produces length through repetition, plus discourse between orchestra and percussion. Evocative it is; but new its methods are not.
