Classical

It's a busy week. English clarinettist Michael Collins and friends are playing in Castlepollard, Waterford, Limerick and Dublin…

It's a busy week. English clarinettist Michael Collins and friends are playing in Castlepollard, Waterford, Limerick and Dublin. The Yggdrasil String Quartet are starting a Music Network tour with a programme that includes Gerald Barry's First Quartet. The Crash Ensemble are bringing their brand of techno-friendly new music to the John Field Room for the first time. And the Hilliard Ensemble (right) launch a new Sunday afternoon series, Now and Then, at IMMA. Baroque violinist Maya Homburger has devised four concerts which will mix early and contemporary music, bringing together local and international performers. Tomorrow's opening concert, by the Hilliard Ensemble (above), features on the one hand, Bennet, Weelkes, Farnaby, Lorenzo di Firenze, and on the other, Piers Hellawell, Maija Einfelde, Veljo Tormis, Joanne Metcalf and Barry Guy. This programme, ranging from Elizabethan madrigals, to new music from the Baltic, includes the world premiere of Latvian composer Maija Einfelde's And I saw a new heaven.

Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan

Michael Dervan is a music critic and Irish Times contributor