On Saturday night, the Sligo Contemporary Music Festival moved from its main venue, the Model Arts Centre, to the Hawk's Well Theatre for a concert of chamber music by Gerald Barry. (Previous events were reviewed earlier.)
The Hibernia String Trio, plus various Irish musicians, played Barry's Piano Quartets Nos. 1 and 2, the String and Oboe Quartets and the solo violin version of Triorchic Blues. The ultra-dry acoustic was a serious problem, and the playing was not as persuasive as one was hoping for. The better performances were of the String Quartet and the Piano Quartet No. 2, where the composer's go-for-it piano playing helped produce some of the panache his music needs.
The best Barry performance came in Owen Lorigan's latenight piano recital. Among several Irish works was a barnstorming account of the original version of Triorchic Blues.
Several of these musicians were at the Model Arts Centre on Sunday and, despite limited rehearsal time, gave sympathetic performances of the winning pieces in the New Music for Sligo competition. There were 43 entries from abroad and 22 from Ireland. The international winner was Coma una nave del cielo, victoriosa, by Luca Belcastro from Italy. The winner of the Irish section was Deirdre Gribbin's How to Make the Water Sound, with Eunan McCreesh taking second prize for The Famished Road. I am sure we will hear these pieces again.
Finally, there was a thought-provoking talk from the festival's guest composer, Kevin Volans, on how he has sought to break free of western conventions, especially about time.
This festival deserves the backing it gets from bodies such as the Arts Council and IMRO. The weekend stimulated one's creative instincts, partly by being organised around people as well as music.
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