The Great Music in Irish Houses Festival New Year's Eve Online Concert
Music: A Message of Hope is the inspiration for the Great Music in Irish Houses Festival’s special New Year’s Eve event, after what has been an extremely difficult year for everyone.
Recorded in the magnificent setting of the Chapel Royal, Dublin Castle, Music: A Message of Hope will be streamed online on New Year’s Eve, Friday, December 31st 2020 at 5.00pm, and will be free of charge for people to enjoy.
Featuring violinist Katherine Hunka, cellist William Butt, clarinettist John Finucane, and pianists Finghin Collins, Fionnuala Moynihan and Hugh Tinney, the programme includes movements from Olivier Messiaen’s evocative and inspiring Quartet for the End of Time, performed alongside works for solo piano by German composers, Clara and Robert Schumann.
Mark Swed of the Los Angeles Times said of Messiaen’s masterpiece: “The miracle of the work - in which bird song is used to represent freedom and gloriously colored harmonies the glory of infinity - is its transcendence of time and space.”
Written by Messiaen as a quartet in eight movements for clarinet, violin, cello and piano, Quartet for the End of Time (Quatuor pour la fin du temps) was first performed on a brutally cold January night in 1941, and gave a measure of comfort to the composer's fellow prisoners at the Stalag VIIIA prisoner-of-war camp, in Görlitz, Germany during World War II.
BOOKING:
The concert will be free to view until Friday, January 15th at 6.00 pm.
PROGRAMME
Olivier Messiaen: Louange à l'Éternité de Jésus
Clara Schumann: Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann Op 20
Olivier Messiaen: Abîme des oiseaux
Robert Schumann: Drei Fantasiestücke Op 111
Olivier Messiaen: Louange à l'immortalité de Jésus
Further information: www.DICMF.com
Presented in partnership with the Office of Public Works in association with Dublin Castle, the French Embassy in Ireland and the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany Dublin
Great Music in Irish Houses Festival is funded by The Arts Council / An Chomhairle Ealaíon and the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media