A call to make parties face the music

ArtScape: They're on your doorstep only once in five years, so get them to face the music. The Forum for Music in Ireland is asking people to quiz politicians about music policy.

The organisation is highlighting the serious underlying problems in the music profession and in music education, and it wants the next government to produce a coherent national policy for music in Ireland.

So it suggests you buttonhole politicians by asking them: what will your party do to implement the model for provision of local music services outlined in the Music Network report? Is your party aware there are potential savings in other departments - health, justice, family and social affairs and so on - from investment in music education? Does your party realise the importance of music in developing the whole child - in terms of self-expression, communication skills and general social skills? Is your party aware of the partnership approach and the "joined-up-thinking" set out in the Music Network report?

The forum has two priorities - equality of provision of local music services; and for musicians to be able to make a viable living in this country - both of which could be addressed by implementing the Music Network Report (see www.musicnetwork.ie).

Local music education schemes have been successfully piloted in Donegal and Dublin since the 2003 report, but they now need to happen across the country, according to the forum, so that every child can have a high-quality music education in jazz, classical, traditional or popular music, regardless of location or parental income.

The Special Committee on Arts and Education's report may produce some "joined-up" results, but in a letter to this newspaper Evelyn Grant of the Forum for Music asks "why should we believe that this will be any more effective than all the other reports which have been left to gather dust since the seminal Deaf Ears report of 1984?".

The Forum for Music says that investment in music in Ireland is lamentable in comparison with other European countries, yet for the first time in our history Ireland has enough money to invest in music. But a proper structure that provides equitable access to music education for all, not just those in large urban centres, is needed, it believes.

Grant decries the fact that music education doesn't feature specifically in the main parties' manifestos and, picking up on the professed unanimity on arts issues at the recent Q&A session with arts spokesmen and women at Andrew's Lane Theatre, but which doesn't seem to result in action or the political will to deal with, for example, VAT on foreign artists' fees, she says: "For too long, there has simply been no political will to take music seriously. The notion of 'the arts as a good thing, along with motherhood and apple pie' has got to be challenged." See www.forumformusic.ie.

Cork braced for blood and fire

It seems to be a case of blood and circuses for the forthcoming Cork Midsummer Festival, with aspects of war a defining theme in the theatrical programme and with two visiting contemporary circuses performing in the Spiegeltent on Emmet Place, writes Mary Leland. The Corcadorca production of Woyzeck, to be introduced by Minister for Enterprise Micheál Martin on board the LE Róisínnext week will run at the naval base at Haulbowline in Cork Harbour from June 20th to July 1st, while the one-man adaptation of Frank O'Connor's Guests of the Nationwith Denis Conway opens at the Everyman Palace on June 20th.

Bringing it all up to date, new festival director William Galinsky is particularly happy to be able to mount the European premiere of The Bath of Baghdad, which he saw at the Cairo International Festival of Experimental Theatre last year and which, as a two-hander, is played by Fayez Kazak - who recently played the title role in the RSC production of Richard IIIat Stratford - and by Nidal Sejari. Written and directed by Iraqi author Jawad al-Assadi - who has been described by Galinsky as the David Hare of the Middle East - and winner last year of the Prince Claus Award for services to drama, the play will be performed in Arabic, with English surtitles.

Corcadorca won't be the only company with site-specific plans, as Stan's Cafe (last year's presenters of the installation of six tons of rice) returns with The Cleansing of Constance Brown, which had its premiere in Vienna last year and which takes place in a specially constructed corridor, with the audience, according to Galinsky, more or less making up the installation.

This year, Playgroup with Tom Creed are staying indoors (last year their site was a train) at the Half Moon but are also offering audiences an opportunity to attend rehearsals of a work in progress for 2008's festival. And, from a programme that includes classical, contemporary, cabaret and rock music, dance, visual and performance art, Galinsky describes the Irish premiere of The Fire Tusk Pain Proof Circusat the Spiegeltent as "one of the most exciting pieces of theatre imaginable: an extreme, post-apocalyptic circus event with a cult following from Glastonbury to Tokyo". Cork is girding its loins.

• A festival of Irish culture next Saturday is to celebrate Louvain 400, commemorating the foundation of the historic Irish College in Belgium in 1607. The Festival of Irish Culture at Louvain's Grote Markt on May 19th is organised by the Louvain Institute and the City of Louvain/Leuven (with support from Tourism Ireland and Culture Ireland) with a line-up of Irish musicians (Kilfenora Céilí Band, Rossa, Líadan, Karan Casey, Iarla Ó Lionaird, and Niall Vallely's trio Buille) promising to fill the streets with Irish music. This is the first day of a week-long celebration of the Irish in Louvain and in Europe.

As part of the celebration, the inaugural summer school (organised jointly by UCD and the Louvain Institute) The Irish in Europe: 400 years, is to take place in St Anthony's College, now the Louvain Institute for Ireland in Europe. It will run from May 21st to 25th, looking at the contribution of the Irish in Europe during the 17th century and discussing Irish cultural identity, the foundation of St Anthony's College, the Irish Colleges in Europe, the writing of Irish history, the great Irish Franciscans' project (including the compilation of the Annals of the Four Masters) and the state of Ireland in the 17th century.

The Louvain 400 programme is linked to the commemorations this year of the Flight of the Earls and the 350th anniversary of the death of Luke Wadding. More information at www.louvain400.eu/programme and www.flightoftheearls.ie.

• The RTÉ PJ O'Connor Radio Drama Awards shortlist of 12 was announced this week, chosen from a pool of 200 plays by writers from Ireland and overseas. The shortlisted writers are George Carroll, Philip Doherty, Kevin Gildea, Ger Gleeson, Ciarán Gray, Garrett Keogh, Shay Linehan, Martin Malone, Kevin Murphy, Tina Noonan, John O'Neill, and Liz Zimmerman.

The 12 plays were shortlisted by producers from RTÉ's drama department, and the final three will be selected by judges including Danish theatre critic and playwright Jesper Bergmann, director, producer and writer John Lynch and novelist Julie Parsons.

As well as a professional production of their plays, the three overall winners get €3,000, €2,000 and €1,000; the winner will be announced on May 29th.

• Having sold out at the Ten Days on the Island festival in Tasmania recently, Corn Exchange's Dublin by Lamplight at London's Riverside Studios got great reviews and is now at the Brighton Festival, where this week it won an Argus Angel award.

The Time Outwebsite said it was "like watching the pen-and-ink strokes of a turn-of-the-century political cartoon leap into full-bodied life. It's like Chaplin with a script by O'Casey: the ensemble pirouette out of the shadowy brick-work of 1904 Dublin as caricatures of hope and desperation."

The London Timescalled it "a remarkably vivid and entertaining period piece", and said the play, directed by Annie Ryan, is "a canny combination of minimalism and excess".

Earlier, in its Ten Days On the Island review, The Mercury Tasmania asked "Why on earth was this extraordinary piece of inspired, award-winning theatre given a season here of just three days? Irish playwright Michael West has fashioned an inventive comedy and tragic tale. Incredibly versatile actors all. A fascinating, tragi-comic masterpiece."