Seoda an Ríadaigh Gael Linn****

Gael Linn celebrates the grand cinematic sweep of Seán Ó Riada's film music in this beautifully executed three-CD box set, released to markwhat would have been the composer's 80th birthday. The entire project lends further colour and shade to Ó Riada's reputation for wide vistas, clear, uncompromising vision and a meticulous attention to detail. His intuitive reading of the national pulse is evident in his Mise Éirescore, illustrated powerfully here by Luan Cásca 1916in all of its 1.17 minutes of glory. The groundbreaking formation and arrangements of Ceoltóirí Chualann are writ large across the second CD, complete with Seán Ó Sé's robust reading of Mná Na hÉireann,and a fleeting taste of Ó Riada's famed liturgical music in Ag Críost An Síol.The aural triptych is completed by his soundtrack for the 1962 film of The Playboy of the Western World.Three-dimensional, impetuous, invigorating: old and new worlds colliding to startling effect. See gael-linn.ie