Reviews

A look at what is happening in the world of the arts.

Fred

Granary, Killarney

Fred have been plying their trade since early January in support of their second album, Making Music So You Don't Have To. Residing in the People's Republic of Cork, they follow that county's penchant for a long line of quirky acts, from Microdisney to Stump and the Sultans of Ping. Their sound, a delicate blend of harmonies and musicianship, is a strange hybrid of rock, folk and frolics. If Brian Wilson were to somehow front a Gypsy Bon Jovi, the results wouldn't sound too dissimilar.

This gig was part of Murphy's Live 2005 - a countrywide competition which selected eight bands to support Irish acts including Ponyclub in Dublin, Alphastates in Waterford, The Frank and Walters in Cork and Fred in Kerry.

An edgy start saw the band ease into their past repertoire and by the time they got around to new material such as Four Chords and the Truth and Topography, most of the audience were well and truly kicking.

Joe O'Leary's vocals, not quite let loose till The Capital Song (Dublin bad, Cork good etc), have a warm quality enhanced by the 1980s guitar playing of Jamie Hanrahan and the slick bass lines of Jamin O'Donovan. Eibhlinn O'Gorman on keyboards keeps the whole thing ticking over, while Justin O'Mahoney's drumming is more Mardi gras than hell yeah, but gets feet stomping never the less. As they might say in Cork, Dowtcha Boys!

Fred play Róisín Dubh in Galway on May 6; The Forum in Waterford, May 20; and Live@Marquee in Cork, July 15

Brian O'Connell

Torleif Thedéen (cello)

Coach House, Dublin Castle

Bach - Suite No 1 in G. Khachaturian - Sonata-Fantasy. Kodály - Solo Sonata

The repertoire for solo cello, like the repertoire for many another solo instrument, is large or small, depending how you look at it. It's large if you simply count the numbers of works available, and there's no lack of variety in the undertakings of composers over the past 100 years or so. But it's small if you choose to count the pieces that are known and appreciated by large numbers of people.

Swedish cellist Torleif Thedéen's touring programme for the Music Network couples two of the acknowledged peaks of the repertoire, the Cello Suite in G by Johann Sebastian Bach and the Solo Sonata of 1915 by Zoltán Kodály, with a little-known work from 1974, the Sonata-Fantasy by Aram Khachaturian, a man best known through music from the earlier end of his career, the Sabre Dance from Gayane and the Adagio from Spartacus, now indelibly associated with the BBC television series The Onedin Line.

Khachaturian, who trained as a cellist, certainly knew how to handle the instrument. The Sonata-Fantasy is flecked with moments of imaginative spark. But even in hands as skilful and impassioned as Thedéen's the moments remained but moments, the quality was not consistent, the sparks didn't ignite.

Kodály's Sonata is a work which almost re-thought the potential of the cello. Thedéen's approach was heart-on- sleeve, strained at times by the technical demands, yet managing to avoid the sense of the neurotic that many performances fall prey to. The best playing, however, came at the start, in the Bach, where the soft grain of the tone was like a sensual velvet nap, the playing at once straightforward and personal, the greatness of the music conveyed with both reverence and character.

Torleif Thedéen performs in Clifden tonight and Letterkenny tomorrow. Details from 01-6719429

Michael Dervan