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Press Release

Contemporary Music Centre Moves to Temple Bar

Dublin, 5 November 1999

The Contemporary Music Centre, Ireland's national archive and resource centre for new music, is to move its operation from Baggot Street to one of the most significant historical buildings in Dublin's Temple Bar. The building, 19 Fishamble Street in the Old City, is an important conservation project and is particularly appropriate for this use given its location directly adjacent to the site of the first public performance of Handel's Messiah in 1742.

The project is a joint venture between Temple Bar Properties, who are carrying out the development, and the Contemporary Music Centre, which has been awarded a substantial capital grant by the Arts Council. Restoration is being carried out in consultation with the Dublin Civic Trust and work will be completed in December with the new building operational from late January 2000.

No. 19 Fishamble Street was built c. 1830 incorporating the remnants of an earlier house from the 1790's. From c. 1830 it was continuously occupied until the late 1970's by Kennan and Sons steelworks. The design team, who are donating their services to this cultural project at no cost are; Burke Kennedy Doyle Architects, Fearon O'Neill Rooney, engineers, Homan O'Brien Associates, mechanical and electrical consultants and Bruce Shaw Partnership, quantity surveyors.

The Contemporary Music Centre has been supporting the work of composers throughout the Republic and Northern Ireland since 1985 when it was founded at the instigation of the Arts Council. The Centre's resources are extensively used by performers and composers nationally and internationally, and its library and sound archive contain the only comprehensive collection in existence of music by Irish composers. It receives funding from the Arts Council, the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and the Irish Music Rights Organisation (IMRO).

Director Eve O'Kelly said, "The move to Temple Bar is a marvellous development for us, particularly because Fishamble Street is so closely associated with the first performance of Handel's Messiah, one of the big events of Dublin's cultural calendar in 1742. The Contemporary Music Centre promotes the composers of today, and we'll be able to provide much better facilities now. Both the Arts Council and Temple Bar Properties have been excellent partners in putting this project together."

Laura Magahy, Managing Director of Temple Bar Properties said that ".. the arrival of the Contemporary Music Centre to Temple Bar adds a major new resource to the area and one which, given the growing importance of new music, will have a prominent place among the now abundant representation of cultural and artistic resources in Temple Bar."