This week marked the end of a year of celebrations for the Royal Irish Academy of Music which has reached the grand old age of 150. There were concerts, recitals, an exchange with the Birmingham Philharmonic and all manner of other musical affairs, and finally this week there were celebrations for two entirely new initiatives.
The first was on Monday night when the President, Mrs McAleese arrived at the State Apartments of Dublin Castle to put her imprimatur on Ireland's first traditional Irish music syllabus. oiri Eireann was most welcome she declared and went on to amuse the crowd with an anecdote about talking to musician Seamus O Suilleabhan who had recently got a degree in traditional music from Queens University. Nobody it seems, was quite sure where to place traditional Irish music so it had ended up in the Ethno-musicology department alongside the musical traditions of Turkey, Islaam and the like.The traditional syllabus was spearheaded by RIAM senior examiner Annette Andrews and the music inspector from the Department of Education, Micheal O h-Eidhin, and tribute was paid to them in speeches by John O'Conor, the director of RIAM; Senator Labhras O Murchu, the director general of Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann, and Gerard Healy, chief executive of PMPA Insurance, which is supporting the new syllabus as well as a promotional tour by as in O'Conor and O Murchu in the new year.
Other people there on that night included Minister David Andrews, the husband of Annette Andrews; Leo Gibney, chair of the RIAM board of governors with his wife Kathleen Gibney; Seamus MacMathuna of Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann; Shirley Kavanagh, director of PMPA; Joanna Crooks, director of the National Youth Orchestra; and Deirdre Kelleher, director of the Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition.
The very next night the RIAM crowd gathered again, this time to celebrate a new history of the institution, To Talent Alone, The Royal Irish Academy of Music 1848-1998. Although the official speaker was the Minister for Education and Science, Micheal Martin, the unofficial guest of honour was Alice Brough, who at 93 is the oldest surviving former student of RIAM. She reminisced with other musicians who had played with her and recalled her days learning the fiddle with her two sisters. John O'Conor, accompanied by his wife, Mary O'Conor, looked unseasonably tanned on both occasions. He had just flown in from a trip to Australia where he had played at an international piano competition in Brisbane and then taken a short two-day break in Thailand on the way back. One of the editors, Richard Pine, was there, declaring that RIAM would always hold a particularly strong place in his heart as that is where he met his partner, pianist Patricia Kavanagh. Richard's two daughters, Emilie and Vanessa Pine, came along to support their dad. Unfortunately the other editor of the book, Charles Acton, who was for many years a critic with The Irish Times, could not make the party due to illness, but his wife, Carol Acton, was there on his behalf.
Other guests included actress Rosaleen Linehan, recently returned from working in Los Angeles; film maker Donald Taylor Black, who is working on a documentary with Richard Pine; John Hynes, chief executive of An Post which supported the book; Michael Gill of Gill and Macmillan; Dr Brendan Goldsmith, the president of the DIT; Judith Woodworth, director of the National Concert Hall; Prof Harry White of UCD, and Terry de Valera.