Micheβl ╙ Suilleabhβin & Mel Mercier/ESB Music Network Tour

For a man who's never been afraid to be out of step with his contemporaries, Micheβl ╙ Suilleabhβin was coralled effortlessly by Mel Mercier's magnificent percussion on this fourth night of their 12-date Music Network tour.

At times it was difficult to tell whether the pair were in free fall or marching to a beat with military precision, such were the complexities of the rhythms they were navigating.

It was a night of unexpected mirth-making. Both ╙ Suilleabhβin and Mercier brought surprising tinctures of grace and danger to the proceedings, often leaving the audience gasping in their efforts to keep pace with the cadences.

╙ Suilleabhβin's repertoire whispered of a new-found blβs, an accent brought out by Mercier's bodhrβn accompaniment on favourites such as O∅che Nollag and The Fox Chase.

His tribute to Sean ╙ Riada soared, with Marcshlua U∅ NΘill and Mβirseβil R∅ Laoise drawing the listener into the tunes with magnetic force.

Then, with a sublime shift from grand to upright piano (the latter salvaged from his earliest days as a novice, and rejuvenated with a vaudevillian paint job), he launched into a full-force gale of a medley, with Bye Bye Blackbird - and much else besides - jostling for space in the melee.

But it was Mercier's two-handed bones playing that stilled the room. It was a remarkable virtuoso display of technique fusing with art.

The concert was bookended with an effervescent Baggedy, Mercier's hiccuping bodhrβn chasing and goading ╙ Suilleabhβin's piano, the two scaling such heights of rhythmic intensity that the audience might have complained of vertigo long afterwards.

It was an unforgettable evening, a mix of madness, mania and sheer musical ebullience.