REVIEWS

Critics from The Irish Timesreview The Burial at Thebesin the Peacock Theatre, Veronica McSwiney(piano) at the National Concert Hall and We Are Scientistsat the Ambassador Theatre

The Burial at Thebes
The Peacock, Dublin

"Money has a long and sinister reach," announces the state's new ruler on his first day in office. "Money brings down leaders, warps minds and generally corrupts people and institutions." Really? Anyone we know? Such is the perpetual resonance of Sophocles' Antigone that Seamus Heaney's graceful, nimble version seems stunningly attuned to the political moment. First staged in The Abbey four years ago, in an ill-suited overbearing production, The Burial at Thebesis now honoured as a vivid and supple work by Patrick Mason's focussed production in The Peacock. Back then, the play seemed heavy with allusions to the war on terror. Today, without any noticeable alterations, it could have been ripped from the week's headlines, as Creon (Declan Conlon) - another subject of rapidly changing family, personal and professional situations - is about to see his political career end in something considerably worse than failure.

We will always find our own preoccupations in ancient tragedy however. Like Heaney's fluid verses, Ferdia Murphy's displaced design allows (rather than encourages) our associations, rendering Thebes as a bullet-pocked concrete city, where 1940s costumes suggest a post-war rebuilding effort and a shrine to the dead underscores the central motif of the play - the sacred rite and dignity of burial. Creon denies this right to Polyneices, "the Anti-Theban Theban" who died leading an attack against the city. Flouting the law of the living for the unwritten law of the dead, his sister Antigone (Gemma Reeves) buries the traitor, setting the conflict and tragedy in motion. Less sensitive productions risk making Creon and Antigone seem more like emblems than living figures: the state versus the individual, the oppressor versus the revolutionary. But here Conlon and Reeves move beyond archetype to explore human frailties. Even at his most despotically resolute, ignoring sage counsel and condemning his niece to death, Conlon's fingers flutter with suppressed misgivings, while Reeves balls her small fists by her sides making her insurrection seems as helpless as it is intransigent.

Such careful details, physical and psychological, are aided by the intimacy of the space, which, under Sinead McKenna's steady lights, ushers the characters through the passage of a single fateful day. The stage can also seem confining though, with the chorus of plummy elders fixed around a board table and too many characters - Chris McHallem's messenger, Aonghus Óg McAnally's well-judged Haemon and even Antigone herself - restricted to one position, diminishing the voltage and vigour of their arguments. Mason's focus may have been the language and while the entire company are in full control of the verse, at times they can appear subservient to it.

As Eurydice, Jane Brennan makes an absorbing exception, achieving something equally poetic with silence when grief robs her of words. As tragedy begets tragedy, Mason treats the final moments of the play not with climactic urgency but as the slow tolling of a bell, or, as Heaney's Chorus interpret the assault of the gods, "like foaming wave on wave across a strand". It is an affecting and sensitive move in a production worthy of the play; lucid, compelling and forever relevant.

PETER CRAWLEY

Veronica McSwiney (piano)
NCH, Dublin

Though Dublin-born concert pianist Veronica McSwiney is now into the second half-century of a distinguished performing career, her hefty evening recital at the John Field Room was totally free of autumnal intimations.

The reasons why her playing has often been described as authoritative were plain to hear: instinctively alert pedalling, unshakeably confident interpretation, and - above all - a vigorous touch.

The decisiveness left little room for poetry. A determination not to oversentimentalise the predominantly 19th century programme meant that the melodies of Field's Sonata Op 1 No 2, Brahms's Rhapsody in B minor Op 79 No 1, and Chopin's Nocturne in D flat Op 27 No 2 were spelled out, as if in bold letters.

At the opposite end of the expressive spectrum, McSwiney's pervasive generosity with energy and brilliance left only small reserves for the musical high points. A sense of denouement thus eluded the endings of Chopin's Waltz in A minor Op posth. and Scherzo No 2 Op 31.

The Scherzo, however, notwithstanding a minor and smoothly rescued memory lapse, showed collected and deferential intentions with a score that all too often gets a scrambled reading.

Some listeners would prefer a more integrated approach to the curiously vacillating first movement of Beethoven's Sonata in E flat Op 31 No 3, yet McSwiney's plan of drawing sharp contrasts between interrogative recitative and breezy passage-work succeeded on its own terms.

A bustling Scherzo, punctuated by satisfying fortissimo crashes, led to a coolly factual minuet, but the breathless finale was optimally paced, combining a crisp texture with intoxicating drive.

In Brahms's Rhapsody in G minor Op 79 No 2, rich bass tones and an engaging rhythmic freedom conjured up dark and vivid impressions of brooding Romanticism, while the prevailing mood in Debussy's Estampes was of sultry yet abstract exoticism.

ANDREW JOHNSTONE

We Are Scientists
Ambassador, Dublin

There are no Bunsen burners on stage; no strangely brewing chemicals or white coats; the safety goggles are off, the amps are lashed up to dangerously high levels, the retort clamp and glass pipettes have traded places with guitars, drums, keyboards and bass. Tonight's experiment will seek to identity the base elements of rock and roll.

We Are Scientists are touring their latest album, Brain Thrust Mastery, and in previous gigs have supported themselves in an amusing rock and roll self-help version of Trisha. Tonight, though, the opening slot goes to Boss Volenti, who tear their way through a muscular set, with a furious rhythm section from ex-Therapy? man Graham Hopkins.

On record, We Are Scientists come across as a bit more synthetic. Sure, there are riffs and hooks, and hulking guitars throwing their weight around blistering drum set ups; but there are also nuggets of polished pop, sparkling keyboard lines and lead singer Keith Murray's vocal has cadences that enter Bowie territory.

Live, though, or at least on this occasion, the pop veneer has been stripped off, extra guitar riffs seem to have been bolted on in their place, the bass grinds and roams the low-end frequencies and the drums hammer through the tracks.

This bunch of boffins are perfect festival fodder; and their upbeat musical circus would have most rooms or fields bouncing in a matter of bars. However, there is a lack of dynamic between the tracks, and while Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt and It's a Hit get a rousing reception, some of the lesser known numbers tend to blend into one another.

The polish the band have brought to their second album seems to have muted the rampant appeal of their debut. But the crackling energy and irrepressible enthusiasm from the stage keep most doubts firmly in check.

LAURENCE MACKIN