It was rhapsodic and oh, so cool. The party to announce the up-coming 2002/2003 season of concerts at the National Concert Hall was in a minor key - guests listened to Maria McGarry play Liszt's Rhapsody in A Minor.
The young pianist from Ballyhaunis, Co Mayo, is currently studying at the Julliard School of Music in New York; only two students are taken on each year to study for the prestigious Artist's Diploma in Performance and McGarry has just completed first year.
She will perform at St Canice's Cathedral at the Kilkenny Arts Festival this summer, and her debut recital is planned for October in the National Concert Hall. He mother, Pauline McGarry, is director of the award-winning Cantairí Béal Atha na hAmhnais.
Pianist Hugh Tinney, artistic director of the Music in Great Irish Houses festival, was limbering up to officiate at the festival's nine concerts, which begins at Farmleigh on Friday, June 7th.
Nick Reed, director of The Helix Centre, the new arts centre at DCU, was getting to know people, having recently started his new post. He chatted to Katie Musgrave from Inniscara in Co Cork and Brisbane-born Julie Taylor, who both work for Arthur Cox Solicitors. The £35 million Helix is due to open in October, he said.
Patricia Geaney and Richard Cooper, of the Goethe Institute Choir, who will be taking part in the Organ Choral Festival in Dublin in June, were all ears, as was Richard Wakely, former managing director of the Abbey Theatre and now an independent theatre producer and arts consultant. He is bringing the Canadian play, Blood on the Moon, by Pierre Brault, to Dublin's Samuel Beckett Theatrenext Tuesday, to give directors and theatre managers a chance to see the play in advance of its proposed Irish tour next year.
Music lovers were talking about the recipient of this year's John McCormack Award - Dublin tenor, Emmanuel Lawler, who performed at the award recital in the Bank of Ireland Arts Centre later in the week. Comhgháirdeachas.
As for the line-up at the National Concert Hall, broadcaster Eamonn Lawlor, picked out Yo-Yo Ma, Barbara Bonney, David Spillane, Dervish and Carlos Nunez to whet our appetites.
And the Italian diva, Cecila Bartoli, whose concert last year was cancelled due to ilness, is coming too in September.