The Cork Midsummer Festival begins today, 15 June, and continues until 24 June, with concerts and events taking place in venues across Cork city.

Fair Plé – the new campaign for gender balance in Irish folk and traditional music – will present a concert as part of Live at St Luke’s on 16 June, with performances by Karan Casey, Pauline Scanlon, The Whileaways, Niall Vallely, Kate Ellis, Anna Mieke and more. Fair Plé recently held a day of simultaneous events and sessions across the country to raise awareness.

Collaborations between artists of different disciplines form a central part of the 2018 Cork Midsummer Festival programme. Commissioned multimedia work In Clouds marks the 40th anniversary of Triskel Arts Centre and is led by director and composer Peter Power, with composer Michael Gallen, novelist Sara Baume, contemporary vocal ensemble Tonnta and dancer/choreographer Stephanie Dufresne. The work will also feature an audio-visual installation by Sarah Jane Shiels and David Mathúna. In Clouds takes place at Triskel Christchurch on 15–17 June at 7.30pm. 

The music strand of the festival also features a collaboration between composer Linda Buckley, poet Doireann Ní Ghríofa, and visual artist Cassandra Eustace. A City in Flames (18 June, 7.30pm, St Peter’s) will be a live performance of poetry by Ní Ghríofa with a ‘sonic landscape’ by Buckley and a visual element by Eustace, exporing ideas of fire and the history of Cork city.  

Backstage, a new site-specific opera by Tom Lane (composer of the Irish Times Theatre Award-nominated Front Of House) will be directed by Conor Hanratty, with a cast from Ulysses Opera Theatre. 

Also on the music programme will be Ailís Ní Riain’s multimedia work Sklonište, performed by Dermot Dunne, Robert Curgenven’s new work for pipe organ, Tailte Cré–Umha/Bronze Lands, and concerts by Camille O’Sullivan, Hauschka, Little Green Cars and Mick Flannery and Hanora George.

For the full programme and tickets, see www.corkmidsummer.com.