Sundays@Noon presents Elizabeth Hilliard, featuring a work by Gráinne Mulvey, and the world premiere of 'Sleepsong' by Siobhán Cleary

Elizabeth Hilliard: voice, electronics.

As part of the Hugh Lane Gallery’s Sundays @ Noon series and in association with the Contemporary Music Centre, Elizabeth Hilliard presents this recital of works written for her voice by three composers. The opening work is a world premiere: Sleepsong by Siobhán Cleary was commissioned by Elizabeth using Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon funds. This work sets Codail Begán from the Pursuit of Diarmaid and Gráinne, a 10th Century tale from the Fenian Cycle of Irish Mythology. Using imaginative live processing and interweaving layers, Siobhán creates an intriguing and mystic setting of this text. Elizabeth has performed Siobhán’s work Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoire many times and is particularly pleased to be again working within the medium of the Irish language in this collaboration with Siobhán.

The next work is also a world premiere: Shroud by Christopher Fox. Christopher is a longtime collaborator of Elizabeth, and she is delighted to have been asked to premiere this work. Shroud is a companion piece to his instrumental trio Iron rain. Christopher writes: ‘During the summer of 2018 my wife, Susan McNally, was in the grip of an incurable cancer and on two mornings I woke up with the very distinct sense of having just heard music. The two “dream-pieces” are my attempts to recall that music and the sense of death-in-life that haunted those days’. Shroud sets a translation of the first stanza of Anna Akhmatova’s Death.

The final item on the programme is Gráinne Mulvey's The Seafarer, setting words from a translation of the epic Anglo-Saxon poem. This was premiered by Elizabeth in Béal 2012 in Smock Alley Theatre, and has been performed many times since. It is a moving work, consisting of sounds of the sea and the voice, representing the sea, mourning and hope. It was written in memory of Úna O’Farrell Tate.

The concert will feature a CMC Composer's Voice Event with the composers Siobhán Cleary and Gráinne Mulvey in conversation with CMC's Projects, Programmes and Events Manager Linda O'Shea Farren.

Programme

Siobhán Cleary - Sleepsong  (commissioned by Elizabeth Hilliard with Arts Council funding)

Christopher Fox - Shroud

Gráinne Mulvey - The Seafarer

Tickets

Tickets are free. Booking opens from Monday 12 September via Sundays @ Noon at the Hugh Lane Gallery website.

All concerts are broadcast on the Hugh Lane Gallery’s Youtube channel in a Concert Catch-up at noon the following week, see the HLG website for more information.