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The Galway Early Music Festival

Social Harmony: When Tradition and High Art Meet
May 17th – 20th, 2012
www.galwayearlymusic.com

This year’s festival looks at what happens when popular culture and high art meet and mingle: when tunes played at a peasant’s wedding find their way into the music played at a castle feast, when hurdy-gurdy and bagpipes become the fashion at court and when baroque harp becomes the instrument of the people.

Concerts feature groundbreaking flute and bagpipe player François Lazaravitch who, with his group Les Musiciens de St-Julien looks at the history of the bagpipe in French music, including the music of the baroque French court; The Harp Consort with Andrew Lawrence-King (Spanish Baroque harp) whose theatrical performance shows how the rhythms of Africa and the New World were integrated into European baroque music; Coracle with Barnaby Brown (bagpipe and triple flute), Siobhán Armstrong (Early Irish Harp) and Griogair Labhruidh (Gaelic Song) who explore the transmission of native Irish and Scottish music from pre-history to the 18th century.

This year Cois Cladaigh Chamber Choir is celebrating its 30th year, and the Festival is thrilled to have them perform the opening concert of the Festival.
The programme also includes a Saturday filled with free family events, from theatre to music and dance demonstrations. Plus, the Festival has commissioned a special project using smart phone technology which will bring the sounds and music of medieval Galway to life in the venues where you might be expected to hear them via your mobile phone.

A foot-tapping weekend of simple melody and complex harmony in the liveliest medieval town in Europe!

For more information: www.galwayearlymusic.com or Email: info@galwayearlymusic.com,
Tel: 353 (087) 930 5506

Permalink - Posted: February 2, 2012 at 12:05 pm