Galway medical orchestra due to perform at Rome festival

Musical medical students at NUI Galway (NUIG) are due to mark St Patrick's festival with a performance at the International Festival of Music in La Sapienza, Rome next weekend.

The event is hosted by the Ernico Simbruina Musical Association of Medieval Cities and aims to promote a special relationship between medical students and doctors, based on the “emotional sharing of musical performances”.

Some 54 students in NUIG's medical orchestra will perform a selection of folk and contemporary material ,including original work by musician, arranger and orchestra director Carl Hession.

The NUIG orchestra will play alongside the Esculapio Ensemble of Padova, comprising 25 medical students and doctors from the University of Padova, and La Sapienza student orchestra, comprising 50 students and professors.

NUIG's medical orchestra was founded in 2011, and is open to students in the schools of medicine, nursing, midwifery and health sciences. It qualifies for academic credits under the special study module programme, which is led by Dr Gerard Flaherty of the NUIG school of medicine.

The orchestra focuses on “the healing power of music, the essential role of the arts in medicine, and the close bonds between the creative instinct and the best of science and medicine”, the university says.

Its producer is NUIG traditional artist in residence Mary McPartlan.