Placed side by side, the words "Christmas" and "music" conjure up a festive tune we've all heard many, many times before: Hark the Herald, Hallelujah and a spot of whatever you're having yourself, writes Arminta Wallace.
The most celebratory cadences of the Christian year have, like most other aspects of Christmas, been packaged into a commodity that is either comfortingly or - depending on your point of view - maddeningly familiar. But what does sacred music mean in, say, Africa, where some languages have no separate words for "music" and "dance"?
Or in Russia where, long before the arrival of Christianity in 998, each village had its own troubadour whose repertory belonged to an oral tradition which stretched back for centuries? The wonderfully-named Anáil Dé (The Breath of God) Festival of World Sacred Music at the University of Limerick's Irish World Music Centre next week will take an in-depth look at various strands of spiritual musical expression from Gregorian chant to Swedish traditional song, with seminars, workshops by musicians and academics from Brazil, Nigeria, Slovakia, Hungary, Sweden and Norway, and a number of public performances.
On Wednesday, December 11th the festival will open with a seminar on two Brazilian masses for choir and percussion by the Brazilian singer and academic Vinicius Mariano de Carvalho; over the following three days there will also be workshops on such diverse topics as Nigerian chant and drumming, chorales in the Swedish vocal music traditiona and Norwegian medieval song. Admittance to the workshops is free and, says Ellen Byrne of the Irish World Music Centre, you don't need to be able to read music to come along and enjoy what should be stimulating discussion and lively music-making.
The traditions of the Russian Orthodox Church will be examined on Thursday, December 12th by Slovakian-born Simon Marincak, who has lived and worked in Russia, and that evening at the university's Contemplative Centre at 6 p.m., the vocal ensemble Lucernarium, made up of students from the University of Limerick, will perform a Gregorian Chant Vespers and a concert of advent music. A Russian Orthodox Vespers and concert of sacred world music will be performed at the Augustinian Church in Limerick on Sunday, December 15th at 7 p.m.
Scandinavian singers have been making quite a number of waves on the world music front in recent times, and one of the highlights of the festival will be a performance by the Norwegian female ensemble Trio Mediaeval. Founded in Oslo in 1997, the group has worked intensively with the Hilliard Ensemble in the UK, but has also developed its own distinct vocal sound in a repertoire which ranges from English and French polyphonic music through Norwegian medieval ballads to contemporary works. Trio Mediaeval will perform at St Mary's Cathedral, Limerick on Saturday, December 14th. Tickets and further information about the festival from the Irish World Music Centre, on 061-202917.
