Review of "Ó Riada Re-imagined"

Reblogged from Voice in the Wilderness:

Review of "Ó Riada Re-imagined"

St.Werburgh’s Church, Dublin, 8pm Thursday 24 January 2013, as part of Tradfest.

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Last Thursday I went to my first choral concert in Dublin for many years. It was very much a spur-of-the-moment decision, so I knew  little about the event before I went other than that it featured a number of musicians whose work I admire.

Read more… 1,201 more words

Here is a review I recently did for my Review blog - worth a look if you are a choral music enthusiast.

“Omnis” and Riverdance, 1995-96.

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anuna, dulaman, michael mcglynn, omnis, riverdance

This week sees the arrival of the new artwork for Anúna’s third/fourth album Omnis. The CD has had no less than five, yes, five separate covers and three released versions. You can see the original artwork at the bottom of this article. You may justifiably ask why have a sixth cover? Are you an obsessive compulsive? Do you have no life?

This new cover was actually intended to be the first one, and despite being pretty off-the-wall now, at the time it fitted into my own view of what Anúna was. You see, in 1995 we were pretty cool, so creating an image such as this would have fitted very much into the ethos that I had created for us. I can’t remember why I didn’t include it as I had planned, but I suspect it was because Omnis was created when Anúna were involved in Riverdance, and the association between both projects wasn’t pleasant.

Its hard to believe that Anúna was once “happening” in the early 1990s in this country. We were a genuine underground “cult” band – rock stars, cool people and our general audience mingled together at our concerts. In 1995 we were stars…

We had an ever increasing following, and while Riverdance catapulted us forward onto an international stage in an unprecedented manner, we had earned the right by 1994 to be called then what we still are today – a true Irish original. While Anúna had migrated from audiences of 3-400  to playing 4000 seater venues with the biggest show on the planet in just a few months, I only saw the original vision I had for the group. I created Omnis to keep my feet firmly planted on the ground, and also to make an effort to bind the singers who had travelled part or all of the way with me to that concept. I decided to record this new album in the same church acoustic as I had Anúna (1993) because many of the new songs needed “space” within them. I believed that I could only achieve this in a sacred space.

At the time of the recording we were two choirs – one in London and one in Dublin. We had always had more singers than we needed on stage, so it was only a case of recruiting a few new faces. I have to admit that it was significantly easier to do this after we had spent 18 weeks at number one in the Irish charts with the Riverdance single, but I find that success usually makes one taller, thinner or more attractive in the eyes of others. Two groups, one at home in Dublin, another in London. Two worlds – one passionately created from hard slog for seven years, the other singing loudly over a backing-track on a London stage full of glamour and stardom. These two collided forcibly in Omnis in summer 1995 and this resulted in a rather unsatisfying series of recording sessions. It was also far more musically complex, demanding a much more choral feel to it than the previous two CDs, and it did stretch some of the singers to the limit of their capabilities.

I remember that Dúlamán and Geantraí were originally one single piece, but needing another up tempo number forced me to split the song in half. Some of the material was wildly odd – O Viridissima was like a banshee conference, while Tenebrae III sounded like it had fallen off the soundtrack of 2001: a Space Odyssey. But for some reason the album worked quite well. The 1995 release sold by the bucket-load at home, probably the first and only time an Anúna album would do so well in our own country. Its mix of traditional Irish songs on the same disc as works by Hildegarde von Bingen was oddly cohesive.

Then we shattered. I decided I had had enough. I couldn’t compete with the trappings of Riverdance. The primary reason I wanted out was a complete lack of any artistic input in the music we sang, with the same material being performed night after night. While some of the singers loved being a minor celebrity in London, they also wanted to be part of the thrill that forms the essence of Anúna. It just wasn’t possible for them to have both. I jumped and they stayed. A handful of singers tried to remain as part of both for a short while, but life is not about going backwards. They eventually went their own ways.

So Anúna was reborn, albeit tainted by a two edged celebrity status in Ireland, something I managed to shake off everywhere else except home. Which was actually great. I was forced to reach beyond these shores, and that is why Anúna still exists today.

Paradoxically the influx of new blood in 1996 resulted in what is arguably one of our finest recordings Deep Dead Blue, but at the time it was pretty hard going for me. By the time Omnis was hot off the presses it was a historical note, not a new album. I remember my mother saying to me after she first heard it that she couldn’t believe something so beautiful had been born out of so much trouble. In retrospect I can’t either. The beauty of it is in the music rather than the performances I believe, and I am still very proud of the compositions on that record. Dúlamán has become a choral mega-hit all over the world thanks to my friends in Chanticleer who included it on their album Wondrous Love in 1997.

For contractual reasons, I had to provide our record company at the time with a new album for US release in 1996, so I decided to re-record Omnis with the new team of singers. This album was called Omnis : Special Edition and is pretty much the same album as the first one. The recording sessions were as difficult as those for the 1995 album. Who wants to record an album twice? I see the two recordings as one project, not two. Neither created in happy times, neither particularly fulfilling artistically. In 2002  I revisited them both, remastered them and there it was – Super Omnis! And it is pretty good… This 2012 issue removes the track Diwant Bugale from the 2002 album, a last minute addition on the 1996 release and instates the new edit of Mariam Matrem Virginem with its beautiful solo by Monica Donlon.

By the way, the image was photographed by the photographer Nigel Brand who
had taken many pictures of the first lineup of Anúna (circa 1991-3). I remember discussing the album with him, and giving him free reign to create a image with an impact rather than something out of the “Celtic Mysts of Ancient Tyme” ethos. Thanks Nigel…

The Beginning – An Uaithne to Anúna

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anuna, choral singers, john mcglynn, michael mcglynn

25 years of clutter. 25 years and piles of analogue videos and cassettes, silently gathering dust and deliberately avoided. Memories of good and bad things, happy and unhappy things. I knew that hidden in the decades of material were things that I simply didn’t need to remember, but there were also things I had forgotten that maybe should be rediscovered. The cassettes were deteriorating so, despite my reservations, I decided to use this small gap in my Autumn schedule to complete the vast task of digitising the Anúna sound archive.

A couple of things became apparent pretty quickly. The first one was how many interviews there are. This is a huge contrast to the period 1994 onwards. Today I rarely am interviewed, but that is balanced by my being able to post my ideas and opinions online. From about 1991 until 1994 there are multiple appearances on panel discussions, reviews, opinion pieces and analysis. Prior to Riverdance in 1994, which resulted in 18 weeks at number 1 in the Irish pop charts and a top 10 single in the U.K., Anúna was hot stuff. Indeed, many of the interviews directly after that mention Riverdance only in passing, as we were already known to most of the journalists for our work prior to that.

A couple of years ago Dr Stacie Rossow wrote her doctoral thesis on my work, and she insisted on interviewing me extensively as, until that point, there was virtually nothing written about my work as a composer. I thought that these interviews we did together were full of new perspectives and insights that I had never expressed before. I was wrong. I had said most of what I needed to say about choral music and my compositions by 1994. I was amazed that I have actually stayed on message consistently for so long despite the decades and experiences that intervened.

Another feature of the interviews was how clear I was about our mandate. I wanted to define an Irish form of choral music. In the late 1980s and early 90s, I had been putting together some eclectic concert programmes – Henry Purcell and Benjamin Britten mixed with Clannad, traditional Irish music mixed with medieval pieces, contemporary Irish classical music mixed with 16th century pieces. However, despite huge effort, An Uaithne were making little impact, with audiences usually only numbering slightly more offstage than on.

In 1990 that changed. I just listened back to our performances at the Cork Choral Festival of that year. We came second in the International competition with a programme of Debussy, Robert White, Pearsall, Gesualdo and my “Tenebrae I”. That was a huge achievement for an Irish mixed voice choir, and the performance was actually quite good. However, it was three songs we sang on the Gala night at the end of the Festival that really shone – “Gól na dTrí Muire”, “Deus Meus” and “A Stór mo Chroí”. I had forgotten the silence that descended on the audience during the performance, and how the power of contralto Yvonne Woods held them so enthralled for the final piece. I remember now that the Lithuanian winners of the International competition came up to me as we left the stage. They had been deeply effected by what they had heard. They described it as something they had never expected, something very different. Despite the fact that we had performed in mismatching costumes and held music, while I waved my hands in a rather futile way, something had happened. An Uaithne had grabbed a huge audience for the first time and held it spellbound.

As I type I am listening to a performance we gave a year later in the Project Arts Centre in Dublin – what a concert! Medieval Irish songs ["Media Vita" and "Christus Resurgens"] combined with contemporary Irish works by various composers including screaming and whispering in the works of Mary Kelly and Michael Holohan. There were movement pieces with tape and dry ice created around my arrangements of the “Caoineadh” and “Gol na dTrí Muire”. Our guests were a rather extraordinary bunch and included Aylish Kerrigan [mezzo], who sang John Buckley‘s Wind on Sea, and Anne-Marie O Farrell [virtuoso Irish harp] mingling their high-classical sensibilities with the Uileann pipes of Declan Masterson and the virtuosic percussion of the great Noel Eccles. I loved our performances of Seoirse Bodley‘s two works “Nocturne of the Self-Evident Presence” and “Homage to Marcel Proust”, an Irish classic of contemporary choral music.

There sitting in the middle of it is the end of An Uaithne and the start of Anúna.

I can now hear two types of singer on the recording. There are large, plummy voices favoured by the classically trained singers I had gathered around me for An Uaithne, but now I can hear the “others” – early music singers, traditional singers and untrained singers. There is a fight going on. The performances are rough, but hugely energetic. Many of the more classical singers or choral groupies are stuck to the inadequately learned sheet music, while the new people are singing without music and without affectation. And there at the end of the night is the first version of The Rising of the Sun – wow! It was specially commissioned for the Project’s 25th Anniversary and it is something else. Then the night was over. I remember my brother John, in his first year with the choir, asking for quiet in the dressing room and thanking me for giving him the opportunity to perform all this amazing music. It was the first time any member of An Uaithne had pointed out that they had gained something from one of my concerts, and I was quite shocked. There was silence, broken only by a few smirks from some of the singers, and then An Uaithne died.

So the archive hasn’t been so painful to transfer after all. The bad bits are far outweighed by the good things. Crucially, it reminds me how many people I have to thank from this period of An Uaithne/Anúna’s history.

In the An Uaithne days there was Professor of music at Trinity College Harmoz Farhat who consistently supported my early efforts with rehearsal space and encouragement, and even attended some of the concerts. He wasn’t even my professor, as I was attached to the Medieval English department. Colin Mawby, my boss at the RTÉ Chamber Choir, consistently programmed my pieces and even commissioned works from me, including my first major work [currently being revised] “Sir Gawain and the Green Knight” for children’s choir, piano, percussion and two soloists. Colin has what he calls a “choral ear” and it was through him that I gained my understanding of pitch and the symbiosis of choral voices. He is a huge inspiration as a person and his music is truly beautiful. He said in 2006 -  “I cannot write choral music unless I work with choirs. Now that’s a subjective judgement: I know that lots of people can do these things; I can’t. I have to write for particular people” – I can only agree with him. Thank you Colin.

I’d like to thank broadcasters Gay Byrne, Pat Kenny, Mike Murphy, Bernadette Comerford, Doireann Ní Bhriain – I don’t know whether any of them had any love for Anúna specifically, but I do remember that their support, and that of their production teams, helped enormously. I want to single two people out in particular – broadcaster Mike Moloney and producer Maggie Stapleton. In 1995, ’96 and ’97 they devoted three shows to my work, and listening to these today reminds me just how important they were at the time.

I can’t end this article without mentioning my friend Sara McInerney-O Malley. Thank you Sal. Rest in Peace.

The Celtic Mass Recording Sessions – Guest Blog by Dr. Robert Taylor

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anuna, Celtic Mass, michael mcglynn, robert taylor, taylor festival choir

My final words in the blog entry made a few weeks ago regarding the recording of the Celtic Mass by Michael McGlynn were these:

It is, of course, somewhat nerve-wracking to be making what will be the world premier recording of the complete Mass. But, while the choir and I are a little nervous, we are far more excited. And honored. What an opportunity. Michael’s music is so wonderful…to contribute to his artistic journey by recording the complete Celtic Mass for the first time is a true pleasure and a responsibility.

I hope we are up the task.

I believe we are.

Well, here I am seven weeks later, having had a summer to reflect, and reminisce on the great experience of recording Michael’s wonderful work. And, though I haven’t begun the editing process yet, I am happy to report that my hope that we were up to the task set before us of recording this work at a high artistic level became a firm realization.

We were. But simply saying, “we were” fails to accurately capture the preparation, the grind, the fellowship, and the fulfillment of the entire project. The only way I can hope to do that is to tell the full story.

To begin, I must reassert what I said in my last blog: I am an unashamed fan of my younger (though not by much!) colleague Michael McGlynn. Of his choir—though his choral sound is quite different than mine. Of his compositions-which seem to me a bit underperformed in the US, though his pieces are popping up on concerts more and more frequently. Mostly though, I’m a fan of Michael’s concept. Michael seems to have successfully combined so much of what I hold dear, and merged it into a coherent whole. Ancient plainchant. Ancient Irish texts and tunes. Modal harmonies. Influences from Dufay to Milhaud to the Irish trad. band Clannad. Just today, while looking for programming ideas for our upcoming 2013 Ireland tour, I was watching the video presentation Michael made to accompany his piece Cormacus Scripsit, with Anuna appearing Druid-like in the forest, then moving to an ancient Irish sacred rune full of mysticism and spiritualism while his wonderful arrangement was sung. I thought “brilliant. Wish that were us!”

So what does one do when you have your own world-class choir, but admittedly admire the concept and music of a colleague so thoroughly? Well, you jump at the chance to record the one big work that said colleague has not recorded with his own forces.

And so, the journey began.

As I mentioned in my last entry, the Taylor Festival Choir has its own history and reputation. I am proud of our artistic product, and proud that its membership has remained a “family”…one with old members that welcome the newcomers into the fold. All of us look forward to coming together for whatever the project might be. And for something like this, the excitement is even greater.

It was with that spirit that we began the process. In-town singers began having sectionals, making sure all rhythms and pitches were in solid shape. Full disclosure: while we were only recording Celtic Mass, we were also performing the Vaughan Williams Mass in G-minor in Piccolo Spoleto. So all members had their musical hands full as the out-of-town singers arrived by car and plane (no idea why no one ever arrives by boat! It is Charleston after all. Maybe its because none of us is Tiger Woods…whose yacht Privacy is docked just a few miles from my house right now).

Prior to the choir’s arrival, however, we had seen more than our fair share of adversity. Funding for the project had been hard to come by, and those of us charged with raising the money desperately made our plea to our supporters until the 11^th hour. Finding the proper recording venue was also a desperate search—thanks to the presence of a national organ conference, in which literally EVERY church and organ (save one, thank God) was taken so as to allow 30 organ scholars a place to practice. I had completely taken for granted that one of our preferred venues would be available. They are always available just after Spoleto is over. Until this year! Thankfully, one church that had the requisite organ and acoustic was available. Bethel United Methodist Church and its Music Director Greg Jones literally saved the day, as they turned over their magnificent sanctuary and organ to us for the needed two days.

Then there was gathering our musicians. I can’t ever remember being so stressed about completing a roster of singers and instrumentalists. Just getting the vocal soloists I wanted in one place, healthy, was a chore. One of our best sopranos, (Tina Zenker Williams) so perfect for a couple of the solos that I just steadfastly refused to even consider anyone else, was only available for one day. Another (Kori Miller), who was equally perfect for the solos I had assigned her, was just coming off a period where she had lost her voice completely, due to a vocal injury. Of course, there were other outstanding sopranos in our group capable of singing those solos. But I can be rather artistically stubborn, to say the least. A new baritone soloist (Brandon Hendrickson), in his first stint with TFC, emerged as a real star. An opera singer and opera director by trade, Brandon just happened to be available on these dates. Thank goodness for that stroke of luck. Our remaining soloists (Jaime Burney, Mike Sheaffer, Ansley Lucas, and Esther Williams) were all reasonably healthy (though Jaime was eating “for two” as they say…and is set to bring the next future TFC member into the world this coming January!) and posed no logistical challenges, thank Heaven. Once scheduling and health issues were dealt with, all soloists were scheduled for coaching sessions. As it turned out, they were all so well prepared and sounded so good that I often chuckled during their sessions, knowing how good they were going to sound in performance and recording. Filling out our instrumental roster, thankfully, went more according to plan. Only the cellist had to be replaced! A replacement was quickly found, and so we began the rehearsal process on the Monday evening before our Thursday and Friday performances.

As always, our first gathering of the full TFC roster began with a meal that was, as usual, served by Charleston’s Olympik deli…and it was divine. The fare included a special pesto flatbread invented by Ali the owner of Olympik himself—served to us by request every time we gather for our first rehearsal. Reunion time was of course required. Eventually, we made our way to the rehearsal hall, and the singing began.

Thankfully, it became quickly apparent that the choristers had come well prepared. Pitches and rhythms were, for the most part, spot on from the beginning, including the newly revised Credo, which had me a bit worried. (A bit more on the Credo in a moment). The major challenge in preparing the piece was, to no one’s surprise, were the pronunciation issues in the Gaelic movements. Kori had a couple of Skype sessions with Michael on Codhlaím go Suan. Sitting in on these were highly educational…and amusing! Michael was warm, funny, but insistent. He lightened up the proceedings with Skype tours of his house, his backyard, and chronicled the putting of his kids to bed! Kori did great with the pronunciation, earning high praise from Michael. Unfortunately, the choir—trained by yours truly—was not as successful in initial attempts to capture the subtleties and nuances of Irish in Michael’s texts. Again, thanks to the miracle of Skype, Michael was actually “with us” from Dublin as we rehearsed a couple of movements. Especially fun was Michael’s explanation that the metric stress of Alleluia: Incantations stemmed from the sound of the mo-ped Michael once drove!

Needless to say, having the composer take part in the preparation of the work at hand was a rare treat. Also a treat was having Dr. Karen Marrolli in the choir. Karen is the author of the only major study of the McGlynn Mass, and her insights served as a foundation for textual and musical study for the choir…as well as the conductor.

After two days of rehearsal, the choir was ready to work with our instrumental ensemble. Thanks to the vibrant musical scene of Charleston, we had assembled a really terrific group of musicians. The strings were top-notch…including none other than my lovely wife Mary. Our harpist proved to be a nearly flawless studio player, and the organist, Dr. Scott Bennett, was miraculously accurate on what is not an especially easy or conventional organ part. A real highlight for me was the Charleston Symphony Orchestra’s Concertmaster Yuriy Bekker playing some of the most gorgeous violin solos you will ever hear. Wait to hear them on the disc. Spine tingling.

Finally, we were all ready to perform. The initial performance, at Circular Congregational Church, went well. But the treat we will all remember was our performance at Mepkin Abbey. To express the radiance we all felt during and after that performance, a brief word is needed about Mepkin itself.

From their own website:

Mepkin Abbey is a community of Roman Catholic monks established in 1949 on the site of the historic Mepkin Plantation located on the Cooper River, north of Charleston, South Carolina. Founded by the monks of Gethsemani in Kentucky, the brothers of Mepkin belong to the worldwide Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance popularly known as Trappist. Following The Rule of St. Benedict, the monks at Mepkin Abbey devote their lives to prayer, spiritual study, work and hospitality.

In short, Mepkin is one of the most beautiful, truly spiritual places in all of South Carolina. Perhaps the most spiritual (this coming from a spiritual, proud member of the Unitarian church) spot I’ve even been to in the USA. When one enters the grounds, you simply feel God’s presence. You just…do.

So it was in this setting that we performed the Mass in a fashion that none of us will forget. At the conclusion of the work, the monks themselves jumped to their feet, and the remainder of the audience followed. What an experience.

It was after this high that we went forth, and after a day of rest began the recording sessions themselves. As I mentioned above, we had been fortunate to essentially be given carte blanche in Bethel United Methodist. Our recording engineer Rich Mays had done his homework, and we entered the facility with everything set. We were ready to go. This first day we had decided to record everything involving Tina, as Monday was the only day she was in town. In order to make sure Kori made it through health wise, we also decided to record Codlaím go Suan on that first day. Both were involved in the Gloria…so our initial session was set. Unfortunately, the Kyrie and Gloria are not especially easy, and getting things perfect didn’t come as swiftly as we would like. Bless Tina, she must have had to sing that final floating high A in the Kyrie what felt like a zillion times. But, thanks to Rich and Yiorgos Vassilandonakis (our session co-producer) things went pretty smoothly. Upon play back, we were all pleased.

The Credo was a special challenge. Michael had apparently written a Credo years before and discarded it. But, he had taken it back out, revised it, and created something truly vibrant. Vibrant, full of mood and texture changes, with writing almost operatic in scope, it was this movement that proved the greatest challenge balancing instrumental forces with the vocal. Precision was sometime difficult to attain, as the quartet was separated from the choir so as to allow them to be separately mic’d. The Gloria offered posed similar challenges, but somehow we sailed through it compared to the grind of the Credo. In the end though, we got it, and I’m confident Michael will be pleased.

We concluded the recording sessions with the unaccompanied Alleluia: Incantations. Maybe it was because it was the last thing we recorded, and we were tired. Or, maybe the piece is just hard. I suspect it was mostly the former, somewhat the latter…but whatever the issue was, Incantations was easily the hardest movement to get “in the can.” We just couldn’t quite nail it. And I began to see our energy level wane. Worse, we were running out of time in our final session on our final day. So…I finally screamed something like “we are not going to give up!!! Let’s gooooo!.” High school-ish…maybe. Certainly something from my background in team sports. In any case, we all perked up, and sure enough, we seem to have gotten it. (I only say “seem” because I write this before we begin to actually edit).

Finally, we were done! As one would expect, many of us headed to a local watering hole, and celebrated our sessions with a well deserved pint or two (or three….). I desperately wanted a Guinness in my glass…and in my memory it was Guinness…but I was recently reminded that they were out of Guinness! So I had some dark beer and apparently pretended it was Guinness! (Hard to do I admit. There is no substitute). I do recall feeling exhausted yet exhilarated, and even upon getting home late that night, I was far too wired to sleep. Thankfully, the ensuing weeks brought rest. Much needed rest. But also, a bit of a let down from the high of TFC coming together, rehearsing, performing and recording Michael’s unique work. His cyber-presence only made the process even more exciting. Certainly, this process was rewarding, exciting, and everything you hope a project of this magnitude might be

Next—editing the Celtic Mass sessions, and recording the James MacMillan Mass next summer. The resulting disc will surely be something we are proud of, and hopefully a disc choral lovers of the world will welcome into their libraries! McGlynn and MacMillan Masses. How exciting a disc is that?! Let’s just hope next summer’s sessions match this past summer’s in terms of overall satisfaction. If they are, this will have indeed been the CD of a lifetime.

 

Rob Taylor

“Illumination” – the new album. Some thoughts…

Tags

anuna, michael mcglynn

I clearly remember the day in 1987 that I set Anúna up. I sat, surrounded by a group of young singers in a Dublin bar, and outlined my plan to create a new choir. This would transcend musical boundaries and eventually create more fluid structures that, I believed, would hugely benefit vocal music in my country. Anúna wouldn’t just be an innovative vocal group, it would be a catalyst for change.

The subsequent journey was incredible. In the last quarter century our voices have resonated through vast halls in China and Japan, and echoed across the sacred spaces of European cathedrals. We have sung together in some of the greatest concert venues in the world including The Royal Albert Hall, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam and Radio City in New York. Our music has taken us through fifteen albums, collaborations with rock stars and symphony orchestras through to video game soundtracks. We have represented Ireland as international musical ambassadors for our country of origin. All this time we have continued to develop and refine the uniqueness of our unique vocal sound and performance practices. Anúna have come further than I could ever have imagined. This sixteenth album is titled Illumination specifically because our journey has been about casting light on so many things – choral music, ancient songs and cultures, performance practices, hidden textual truths. Despite so much success and international recognition, there is one way we have not succeeded.

When I was nineteen I joined my college chamber choir. It was my first choral experience, and the profound effect it had on me gave birth to Anúna. I wanted to define a specifically Irish form of choral singing that, while acknowledging the many weaknesses of our music education system, would utilise the indigenous musical river of sound that was innately part of Irish people. Grand ambitions…instead of being absorbed into the existing choral infrastructure, or even confronted, Anúna was simply ignored by the very institutions that it was partially created to enhance. I did try. Very hard sometimes, presenting ideas, experience, challenges to those people and institutions that practice this art form in Ireland. Today Anúna continues to exist despite rather than because it was born from this land of music. While this saddens me a little, I could never have anticipated the huge response to both Anúna and my own compositions all over the world.

Initially when I began recording Illumination with my long-time collaborator Brian Masterson, it was with the intention of presenting music which had featured as part of the history of the choir, material previously unrecorded or incomplete. We also wanted to develop further some of the unique recording processes that we had experimented with over of the years. All of the material on the album is newly recorded despite some of the original arrangements and songs dating back as far as the late 1980s.

I had to include three songs that we were constantly being asked for on CD, “Dormi Jesu”, “Illumination” and “Cúnnla”, all of which have featured in our live repertoire since around 2007. Then there were the many pieces that had, for various reasons, never made it on to a CD. Foremost among these were “Fegaidh Uaibh”, which dates from 1999 and was intended to be the tail end to the piece “Ocean”, “Agincourt” and “Mignonne Allons”. The latter two songs were intended for the earliest albums by Anúna but didn’t make the cut. “Agincourt” was replaced by “Heia Viri” on Invocation in 1993 while “Mignonne Allons” was simply forgotten at various sessions because its art is concealed in its deceptive melodic simplicity.

“La Chanson de Mardi Gras” started life as an arrangement that I made of the well-known Cajun folksong for a beer commercial in 1990, and it is here presented as a complete piece, displaying many of the characteristics that I would later use in some of my best-known songs. “Summer Song” exists in various aborted recorded versions over the last decade or so, and is, at last, here presented on disc. I made four separate attempts to set the text of one of my favourite Irish songs and here present what I came up with in the form of “Siosúram Só” specially written for the 2011 Anúna International Choral Summer School.

Other pieces are included because they tie up loose ends of our history. “Fionnghuala” is presented with Gaelic pronunciation as accurately sung we can manage in an arrangement I did for the massive 2007 PBS project Anúna : Celtic Origins. I have also separated off the two folksongs “Greensleeves” and “Scarborough Fair”, as they were originally presented as a medley for that TV special. “My Songs Shall Rise” completes the cycle of poems I set by the Irish writer Francis Ledwidge. “Ah Robin” acknowledges where Anúna came from, as our original repertoire consisted primarily of music dating from the 11^th to the 16^th century. My love of English music and text from this period has been hugely influential on the sonic direction the choir have taken over the decades.

Finally there is “Danny Boy”. I set this last year, and I have to admit that it took me considerable effort to do so. Ireland is two things, a real place and a dream. As a real place it can leave a lot to be desired. It is a country where systemic corruption, nepotism and parochialism have been tolerated and allowed thrive, but it is also a dream. As a dream it is unique. The land itself is old and very beautiful. The folk music is among the finest on the planet, and the people, to this day, dance words on their tongues. I’m not sure why I have chosen to include the song on an album now. Maybe its because I see the song for what it is at last, a beautiful melody with a universal text. Maybe there really is no such thing as a real place, and dreams, like Anúna itself, can be formed and made real with enough belief and honest passion.

Michael McGlynn, May 2012

“The Celtic Mass” and the Taylor Festival Choir – Guest blog by Dr. Robert Taylor

Tags

anuna, michael mcglynn, robert taylor, taylor festival choir

Michael McGlynn writes :

In the world of choral music I am frequently amazed at how interconnected we all are, all doing the same basic things for the same purpose. Having my works performed by excellent choral groups is not only interesting for me as a musician – it is deeply humbling. I turn this blog over to Dr. Robert Taylor, a brilliant musician and a man with his own unique vision for choral music.

Before I do, I have to mention Dr. Karen Marrolli‘s dissertation at the Louisiana State University entitled “An Overview of the Choral Music of Michael McGlynn with a Conductor’s Preparatory Guide to His Celtic Mass”. You can read this beautifully written thesis (which flatters me vastly…) here.

I have to point out that the elusive “Credo” conspicuously absent from Karen’s thesis and mentioned below, while it dates from 1991, was substantially revised for the first performance of the orchestrated version of the Celtic Mass last November at Florida Atlantic University conducted expertly, and passionately, by Dr. Patricia Fleitas. Up until last year I simply was so unhappy with the movement that I hadn’t included it as part of the standard scores for the Mass. The entire work was written between 1989 and 1991 and I am very proud of it today. I want to personally thank all of those who have shown such faith in this work.

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In two weeks, my choir the Taylor Festival Choir and I have been given the opportunity to record the Celtic Mass by Michael McGlynn. Not only to record, but make the world premier recording of this wonderful piece.

We (TFC) have performed the Celtic Mass before. Twice, in fact, in our 2010 season. But now it’s for “keeps,” as we create what we hope will be a recording that reaches choral music lovers around the globe. Michael has revised his work to include string quartet, and has added a newly revised “Credo”. To say we are excited is an understatement. We will perform the Celtic Mass on June 7 and 8 on the Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, SC–the second performance being at Mepkin Abbey on the Cooper River, perhaps the most beautiful and spiritual spot in all of South Carolina. We will then record on June 11 and 12, and we are hopeful Michael will be able to come to our magnificent city to watch and hear the proceedings.

I first encountered the artistry of Michael McGlynn and Anúna in 1997, watching a DVD of Riverdance. I still remember the impact of their performance. I felt as if I were walking along an Irish beach, mist in my face, ancient ruins within sight, with a general feeling of the spiritual and mysterious. I was immediately hooked. Which is saying something…because I can be a bit of a musical snob.

I was watching Riverdance in the first place because I had become a lover of Irish traditional music the moment I heard Karen Casey, John Doyle, Seamus Egan, Winfrid Horan et al and their band Solas on Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion a couple of years earlier. As a classical musician, this “new” music (new to me anyway) quickly became my recreational music. Music at least somewhat removed from my classical world while still being something genuine and interesting. Full disclosure: my wife is first generation Irish, her parents coming from Co. Mayo and Dublin. At the time, she was strictly a classically trained violinist and Suzuki violin instructor. But, she had listened to Irish traditional music in her parent’s household, and had never lost her love for the tunes and rhythms of her childhood. So, she encouraged and “educated” me in the genre, and together we became aficionados. (I am, by the way, Irish on my Mom’s side…as well as English, German, Native American…well…a true American mutt). Eventually, she turned her classical chops to traditional music, and 13 years later is a wonderful fiddler and Director of the fiddling group Na Fidleiri.

A few years later, after my family and I had moved to Charleston, I expanded my McGlynn musical experiences. I purchased several Anúna CD’s, found Michael’s list of works, and really began to explore Michael’s music. I was immediately drawn in by Michael’s writing. It was unique, yet somehow familiar in a hard-to-describe way. It was clearly Irish, and had many characteristics of Irish traditional music. But there was something more. There were influences from Continental Europe that were unmistakable. And a real sense that Michael had somehow combined the modern with the ancient in a way that reminded me of my hero Ralph Vaughan Williams—yet, again, in a way unique to Ireland. I became a genuine fan of Michael McGlynn’s compositions.

I first met Michael in 2007, when I travelled to Ireland on my first academic sabbatical. I emailed the general Anúna address, having no idea who would read the message, and in shockingly quick fashion, I heard back from Michael himself. We met up at a city centre sushi eatery, talked about my interest in “Celtic Music” (he challenged my use of the word “celtic”) and my ambitions for the Taylor Festival Choir and the Taylor Music Group. We discussed Michael’s music, and he in fact suggested his Celtic Mass to me as something that might be a vehicle for my choir. Later in the day, on his invitation, we went to watch Anúna rehearse, and were impressed with the intensity and seriousness of the rehearsal process (extra impressive given that it couldn’t have been more that 40 degrees in the sanctuary where they rehearsed). It was an inspiring meeting, and happily we have stayed in touch since that time.

I came back to the states determined to champion Michael’s music stateside. And so I did, performing his “Media Vita” and “Christus Resurgens” at the National Collegiate Choral Convention with my excellent College of Charleston Concert Choir, and exploring other repertoire, including the Celtic Mass, with the Taylor Festival Choir.

Before continuing the story about how we came to the point of making this recording, a few words about the Taylor Festival Choir and the Taylor Music Group. My father, Bob Taylor, passed away in 1997 at the age of 61. A choral conductor himself, his high school choirs won plaudits and honors in the state of Arkansas for 25 years. When he passed, my wife, mother and I agreed we wanted to honor his legacy. So, the Bob Taylor Festival Choir was formed, and a non-profit organization called the Taylor Music Group to support it. We also soon founded a small music festival in our hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas entitled the Bob Taylor Music Festival, and in Charleston a Celtic fiddling ensemble for kids called Na Fidleiri (which has gone on to become nationally renowned in their own right). The festival was (and is) a 5-day gathering that focuses on musical performance and education in classical and folk music. Lessons on instruments of the classical and folk traditions are offered, as are dance classes, singing masterclasses, and afternoon and evening performances. After three years we made the decision to move the festival to Charleston. This summer we begin having this festival as a sub-festival within the renowned Piccolo Spoleto Festival.

The idea for the Taylor Festival Choir was fairly simple. We wanted to establish a chamber choir equal to any in the US, and possibly the world. Our models were professional groups such as the Sixteen, Polyphony, the Netherlands Chamber Choir, and, here in the US, the Dale Warland Singers and the Robert Shaw Chorale. I knew that while Charleston was a wonderful place, it might not be a large enough metro area to allow me to consistently maintain a roster of 24 singers of the caliber that I wanted or needed for a truly world-class choir. Our idea was to use the best Charleston singers, (including students from the College of Charleston, where I am Director of Choral Activities) and supplement them with singers from around the country that I knew personally. The end result was a choir with musical and vocal virtuosity, but also a homogeneous choral philosophy, as most of the singers over the years have been current students, former students, or like-minded colleagues. Because there is a core of singers that have been there from the beginning, and newcomers tend to associated with the College of Charleston, and perhaps most of all because of the mission to honor my deceased dad, TFC is a true musical family. My mother, the group’s true matriarch, sees to that! Which I love, because I believe a choir that cares about one another sings more beautifully, with more concern about ensemble.

Of all its musical attributes, TFC is probably most frequently praised for its tone–a rich, round, yet controlled tone. My sound preference is probably something like “Robert Shaw meets King Choir College”…which on the surface may sound incongruent, but in the end seems to work quite well. We emphasize rhythmic precision and excellent intonation above all things. Since our inception, TFC has performed throughout the US, and has produced two commercial recordings, both critically acclaimed. After our initial commercial recording, it became obvious the we needed to drop my father’s first name, as critics and audience members on tour began to call me “Bob”. So, “Taylor Festival Choir” we became, a choir dedicated to choral excellence, and to honoring my father’s legacy. We were particularly honored to perform, by invitation, at the American Choral Directors Association Silver Anniversary National Convention in 2009. We perform the finest literature available from all eras, with particular emphasis on new music, and folk music from the Celtic nations

Which is why the Celtic Mass truly fits the Taylor Festival Choir like a glove. It is deep music. Spiritual music. Challenging music. The choir enjoys it in the same way they enjoy singing other modern composers such as Eric Whitacre, Stephen Paulus, Tarik O’Regan or John Tavener. And because it is a “Celtic” mass, with some Gaelic texts, and has textures, melodies and rhythms stemming from traditional Irish music, it certainly fits the Taylor Music Groups stated desire to serve both “classical” or “art” music and folk music in the Celtic traditions (however clumsy these stereotypical categories ultimately are).

We will be recording at Bethel United Methodist Church, one of Charleston’s wonderful old churches with a wonderful acoustic. Our instrumental forces are absolutely top notch, including my wife Mary on violin, as well as Yuriy Bekker, Concertmaster for the Charleston Symphony Orchestra. We will record over two days, with two sessions on each day. I will be working with Rich Mays as recording engineer, and Yiorgo Vassilandonakis as session producer. It is, of course, somewhat nerve-wracking to be making what will be the world premier recording of the complete Mass. But, while the choir and I are a little nervous, we are far more excited. And honored. What an opportunity. Michael’s music is so wonderful…to contribute to his artistic journey by recording the complete Celtic Mass for the first time is a true pleasure and a responsibility.

I hope we are up the task.

I believe we are.

Rob

Dr. Robert Taylor is the Founding Artistic Director and President of the Taylor Festival Choir and Taylor Music Group, Director of Choral Activities at the College of Charleston, and the Director of the Charleston Symphony Orchestra Chorus and the CSO Chamber Singers. Called a “rising star in the national choral scene,” Taylor’s choirs have been described as sounding “more musical than would seem possible,” and have received numerous plaudits from critics and choral specialists for their technical proficiency, musicality and beautiful sound production.

Dr. Taylor’s ensembles have performed throughout the United States and Europe. They have been featured in numerous festivals and special concerts, including the 2009 and 2005 American Choral Directors National Conventions, the 2008 National Collegiate Choral Organization National Convention, and multiple appearances in regional and state ACDA and AGO conventions. Dr. Taylor’s groups also appear annually in the prestigious Spoleto Festival U.S.A. and Piccolo Spoleto Festival. Dr. Taylor has conducted over 30 major choral/orchestral works to critical acclaim. His recording of Vaughan Williams’ Epithalamion and An Oxford Elegy was favorably reviewed by the American Record Guide and Fanfare magazines—Fanfare declaring the recording “a highly accomplished performance” and stating that “Taylor and his forces capture (Vaughan Williams’ score’s) ebb and flow perfectly.”

He has prepared numerous choral/orchestral masterworks for performances with prestigious conductors such as David Stahl, Dr. Joseph Flummerfelt, and Dr. Kenneth Fulton. His semi-professional ensemble, the Taylor Festival Choir, has been hailed by critics and choral specialists alike as being one of the nation’s finest. This group’s critically acclaimed second commercial recording, Sing We Now of Christmas, features Celtic music stars Liz Carroll, John Doyle, Kim Robertson, and his wife Mary Taylor. Taylor leads the Taylor Music Group, which supports musical performance and education in classical and Celtic music. He also directs the choral strand of the College of Charleston’s Master of Arts in Teaching in the Performing Arts degree, and serves as editor of the Robert Taylor Choral Series with Colla Voce Publications.

Illuminating “Illumination” – guest blog by Dr. Stacie Lee Rossow.

I was lost. Thank you Michael.

Your directions were excellent and entertaining, but far too nebulous for this Floridian.

After wandering through an industrial area of Dublin city for some considerable time I saw two Anúna men coming out of a bakery and, at last, I found the world-renowned Windmill Lane Studios. The previous week I had been one of the facilitators at Anúna’s First International Choral Summer School (July 2011), and Michael had casually mentioned that Anúna would be recording parts of the new album Illumination. Would I like to come along and see the choir in action? I was delighted, as I could fit this in for a few hours and even have a last visit with my friends before returning to Florida the next day. I climbed up the three flights of stairs in the old Dublin building to the studio, innocently looking forward to an interesting experience. On entering the large and modern studio I was met by Michael, beaming. He announced to the assembled choir that I was to serve as conductor for the forthcoming seven hour session. I was, as you can expect, delighted and horrified simultaneously, but if there is one thing I have learned working with Michael it is to expect the unexpected.

Anúna record in an unusual fashion, with the conductor standing in the center of the choir. This means that some of the choir are behind you. This is complex enough to deal with, but almost immediately I became incredibly aware that the floor creaked. A conductor by definition, MUST move, especially for one like me who is accustomed to conducting in buildings created to withstand hurricanes in South Florida.

In hindsight, I think the necessity to minimize my movement helped me to work with this unique ensemble. Anúna never use a conductor and were completely unused to following a standard beat. Much of what they do involves acute listening, being aware of each others breathing and watching each other for physical cues. I was forced to make each and every motion count focusing on what was of the greatest necessity for them at that moment.

That afternoon we worked on many tracks including Fegaidh Uaibh, Summer Song, Dormi Jesu, Siosúram Só, Danny Boy, and a piece that I commissioned in 2009, My Songs Shall Rise. At first there was a little resistance to working with a conductor, but by the end of the session, so many of them who had never been forced to rely on a conductor for cues were thanking me. It appears that while Anúna love working without a conductor in performance, in studio Michael was less-than-patient with people who couldn’t follow the quasi-mystical ideas of pulse and breath that have made Anúna’s performances and recordings world-renowned.

You may ask how a choral conductor from Florida came to be involved with an Irish choral ensemble who work without a conductor… Well, it was actually an interesting journey. In 2008, as I began to formulate ideas for my doctoral thesis at the University of Miami, I was stumped for a topic. I remembered a conversation with Dr. Patricia Fleitas, my undergraduate and master’s professor at Florida Atlantic University about wanting to do something in my master’s to synthesize Irish music. When I was in high school a friend gave me a “world music” CD that contained Puirt a Beul [mouth music] by the Scottish female duo Sileas (Michael informs me that Sileas have done a number of concerts with Anúna. Small world…). I was so intrigued by the rhythm, language, and melody that I learned the piece off by heart, having NO IDEA what the words were or if I was even grouping the words properly in my rendition . Funny thing – to this day I remember almost all of it. It was a sound that stuck with me. Dr. Fleitas, always the practical one, told me “Oh no… that is something for your doctoral work someday.”

It was that conversation that came back to me during my first year of doctoral work. So I set about to find a choral composer whose work was interesting enough to warrant doctoral research. I went through all the normal means of finding composers. I searched Oxford Music Online and came up with two names: John Ireland [actually an English composer] and Charles Villiers Stanford [an Irish composer usually classified as an English composer]. Unfortunately (or fortunately), there was already so many documents written on both that I knew that was not going to work out. So, I set out on a quest. I had all of these CDs with Celtic and Irish music performed and written by unfamiliar names – there had to be composers or arrangers listed. Only one of the CDs in my possession had the name of an ensemble or composer listed; Anúna was the ensemble on the CD of Riverdance that was in my living room. An internet search for Anúna brought me to dozens of scores by Michael McGlynn. Then I looked at a Chanticleer CD (Wondrous Love) and the Irish selection Dúlamán was by the same person. Well, if this composer’s music was recorded by Chanticleer, then …

So, with deadlines approaching I wrote to Mr. McGlynn. In May 2008, he told me that my first idea of Celtic and Irish choral music and arrangements would be “pretty tricky… not a great topic I have to say.” So, I set off to research further and refine my idea. Over the summer I was able to narrow it and wrote back to Michael in September 2008:

“[My professor suggested the possibility of using your "Celtic Mass" as the basis of the dissertation and working around the Irish musical/traditional influences found in a sacred composition. I immediately LOVED the idea as it was truly what I had been wanting to do for some time..."

My subsequent correspondence with Michael nearly made me forget the entire idea. Not only did he tell me at one point that there were too many flaws in certain components of his work but on another occasion, when I asked for his permission to interview and use his scores, he replied only “You don’t need my permission.” That was the entire response to a quite lengthy email!

Funny thing about life though, events are put in your path that bring people to you. A few months later I applied for a research award, The Theodore Presser Award for Research in Music. I applied only because it was expected that all doctoral students in my department do so, I never anticipated the call to the Dean’s office to inform me that my proposal had been chosen. The application was to allow me to visit the composer and other people and locations in Ireland that summer and then to complete my doctoral recital with a visit from the composer. He would interact with the university community and community at large, and would include a commissioned work for performance with a university ensemble, in this case The Frost Chorale.

My first meeting with Michael was as he was preparing for a performance of his music with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra [Ireland's national orchestra] at the National Concert Hall, Dublin, later that week. It seemed, even though we came from diametrically opposite training, we understood each other immediately and what the other was trying to accomplish. Although we had various correspondences and Michael responded to questions about his music, our next meeting was not until he came to South Florida in February of 2010 to complete the process. By that time I had already finished my complete draft of my thesis and was ready for my final recital, which was comprised entirely of his music.

During his twelve-day residence, numerous drives from his Ft. Lauderdale hotel to the Coral Gables campus, and dinners, I came to the conclusion that the vast majority of my thesis needed to be rewritten. All background information I had accumulated on Michael before I interviewed him was in the form of interviews he had given over the decades directly relating to Anúna. Indeed he had become so closely associated with this unique choral body that often his role as an original and singular composer was hidden behind his having to promote a tour, or an album in interviews. I was very surprised to discover so little information about his music in Irish music resources. My conversations with him were frustrating and illuminating simultaneously. One conversation would be contradicted in the next, absolutes became uncertainties between lunch and dinner. Michael explained to me that, as he had neither been interviewed about his music, nor discussed it with a music journalist or fellow composer by any academic his theories on vocal production and choral composition needed to be teased out slowly an carefully. These interviews with me involving question and response were causing him to examine, without his PR hat on, what it was he had based his life’s work on for the first time ever.

Kathartic as this may have been for Michael, I was acutely aware that my final draft was due to be handed in two weeks later and he would conveniently be leaving for a two-week tour of the Netherlands almost immediately upon his return to Ireland. On the last afternoon of his stay, we sat in a restaurant for hours while I asked (actually demanded) final and absolute clarity from him. The result… The Choral Music of Irish Composer Michael McGlynn. That April I premiered the commissioned unaccompanied choral work My Songs Shall Rise with the Frost Chorale at the University of Miami.

I have always viewed my role as a conductor as one that should be unobtrusive; it is not about me. I am merely the prism that focuses the ensemble-generated sound and energy into something that is unified and, hopefully, together we create something beautiful, a rainbow of sound if you will. I think it was this concept that Michael and I connect on. I conduct from the front of the ensemble much as he does vocally from within. It is the reason that later in 2010 Michael contacted me to see if I would be interested in serving as a facilitator at the first ever Anúna International Choral Summer School at the National Concert Hall. As fate would have it, in May 2011 the department of music faculty at Florida Atlantic voted to ask Michael McGlynn to serve as the 2011-2012 Dorothy F. Schmidt Eminent Scholar in the Arts. The rest, as they say, is history.

As Anúna celebrate their 25^th Anniversary, Michael has reliably informed me that our association has helped hugely in the definition of both his work and, as a consequence, the future of Anúna. I am delighted to have been able to contribute so directly to the creation of Illumination, the 16^th album by Anúna. I know that our association has been greatly insightful for me as both a conductor and musician. Onwards to the next 25 years!

You can read Dr Stacie Rossow’s entire thesis online HERE.

Stacie Lee Rossow, D.M.A

Associate Director, Choral and Vocal Studies. Conductor, Women’s Chorus

A native of Florida, Stacie Rossow has been a member of the faculty at Florida Atlantic University since 2000 and has served as conductor of the Women’s Chorus since 1998. She has taught courses in choral conducing, choral literature, applied voice, and sight singing at Florida Atlantic University and serves as a member of the departmental committees in Music Education and Curriculum. Rossow holds Bachelor of Music in Vocal Performance and a Master of Arts with an emphasis in Choral Conducting degrees from Florida Atlantic University under the tutelage of Dr. Patricia P. Fleitas and a Doctorate in Musical Arts degree in Choral Conducting from the University of Miami. Her thesis, entitled The Choral Music of Irish Composer Michael McGlynn, was the first of three graduate papers on Mr. McGlynn and is held in the Irish Traditional Music Archive. Dr. Rossow has participated in conducting master-classes with Dr. Morris Beachy and Robert Porco and the FAU Women’s Chorus, under Rossow’s direction, has performed at the Florida ACDA Fall Conference. Recently she has presented sessions and served as clinician and conductor at state conferences and symposiums.

Dr. Rossow is an active adjudicator and clinician and holds memberships with the National Society of Collegiate Scholars, MENC: the Music Educator’s National Conference, the National Association of Teachers of Singing, the American Choral Director’s Association, National Collegiate Choral Organization, College Music Society, and Chorus America. She has held positions with the state boards of FCMENC and FMEA, has served as the FAU chapter advisor to both ACDA and MENC, and was the 2005-2006 recipient of the Florida Atlantic University Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Advising. While at the University of Miami she was awarded the Theodore Presser Award for research in music for her work in the area of Irish choral music. Dr. Rossow served as a faculty member at the Anúna Summer School in Dublin during the Summer of 2011 and as studio conductor for Anúna’s upcoming CD.

Requiem for the Lost Souls of the Titanic

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anuna, philip hammond, requiem, Titanic

Last year my friend and fellow composer Philip Hammond was in a coffee shop in Belfast with me. He told me about this amazing piece he was writing. The title would be “Requiem for the Lost Souls of the Titanic” written in memory of those fallen to the dark depths of the ice cold ocean. His passion was infectious, so I jumped in and offered Anúna for whatever he wanted simply because the idea was so inspiring and so appropriate to the centennial of the loss of that great ship.

I am a composer, and Philip is one of the very few that I have any contact with on this island, and is the only one I ever talk about music and composing with. His music style is closer to mine than any other Irish composer. He is resident in Belfast, where I met him first in the latter part of the 1990s. Indeed it was Philip who recommended me to the Ulster Orchestra as a composer. The recommendation eventually led to a commission and an album “Behind the Closed Eye”. He is a very modest man, a deep thinker with a wicked sense of humour and many genuine friends. So many of them were involved in this project.

I’ll let Philip introduce the piece himself :

Anúna’s contribution amounted to the Sanctus/Benedictus and a fantastical section at the end of the Lux Aeterna in Hebrew invoking the four Archangels. You can find a very good article about the performance here.

There were two performances – the first on the night of the 14th of April. Both concert was a spectacular success. St Anne’s Cathedral was beautiful, and the event became almost ritualistic. There was a bit of a media scrum to photograph Anúna entering with candles mid-way through the work, and I have to say that despite the unintentional humour generated by a camera being fired off six inches from my face while I was singing, we helped add to the overall drama and atmosphere of the night very fittingly.

The Titanic sank at 2am so after the performance we processed through the streets of a deserted city to Belfast City Hall where we we bowed our heads in silence for a moment to remember those who passed away in such terror. The atmospheric readings by Glenn Patterson, all related to the Titanic event, in combination with excellent playing by the Fidelio Piano Trio were very appropriate even inserted into the huge choral sections of the Requiem. However, the true stars of the night were the voices of the combined choirs - The Belfast Philharmonic Society, the Schola Cantorum of St Peter’s Cathedral and Cappella Caeciliana – and the brass ensemble The Downshire Brass Band.

Rehearsing in St Anne's Cathedral

Anúna with Philip Hammond, centre

The next day we were involved in the insertion of the Requiem into a Roman Catholic service at St Peter’s Cathedral off the Falls Road. Some of the highlights for me, besides the magnificent score, were the amazing combined choral and brass effects of the three other choirs. The boys of St. Peter’s Cathedral provided beautiful singing – spine-tingling is the appropriate description and we shared a very crowded balcony. I only regret that the size of the forces needed prohibits many repeated performances, but to actually perform the music as part of a Mass was both powerful and moving for all the performers involved.

The boys of St Peter's Cathedral in St Peter's.

The Belfast-born, now New York-based, mezzo soprano Jacqueline Horner-Kwiatek was nothing short of spectacularly good in both perforamnces. Many of you may be familiar with her work with Anonymous 4, but nothing prepared me for the level of virtuosity that she exhibited for her very difficult solos. Jacqueline is a very elegant lady, and I very much hope the our paths cross again professionally in the near future!

Jacqueline, Philip and myself

I speak for all of Anúna when I say that we had a memorable weekend. It was particularly poignant for the seven members of our choir who come from Northern Ireland. Thank you Philip for giving us the opportunity to be part of this monumental and wonderful event. Your music was truly inspired.

For a very limited time you can hear the opening section of the Requiem streamed on the BBC website – you have 5 days left to listen HERE!

The Choir, the Violinist and True Love in Sweden

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anuna, linda lampenius

Sometimes my job can be simply magical. Maybe it is something to do with the music, or maybe it is the ambiance generated by the performance. Or maybe life is full of magic, and I have simply been lucky to see it from a different perspective to most.

Last November Anúna gave two very special performances in Sweden. We have only performed once in Stockholm, so I was anxious to sing there again [our last visit being in 1996]. This time we had a very special friend with us, the violinist Linda Lampenius. She looked radiant and played beautifully, as always. The next night was Annedalkyrka, Gothenburg one of my favourite places to perform in the world.

Anúna perform with Linda Lampenius (violin), Sofia Kyrka, Stockholm [pic. A.McGlynn]

Linda Lampenius [pic. Tommy Wiberg]

In October a young man by the name of Kristian wrote to me to ask me for a favour. I’m usually not great at deviating off the focus of a performance I have to admit, but this was a very special request for a special person.

The performance was technically so complex that I had put Kristian far to the back of my mind so, as I read down the programme, I noticed that there was one odd piece on it. Suddenly all that occupied my mind was Kristian… the song was “The Flower of Maherally”, one I don’t sing very often anymore, but I had been asked for a special love song.

You see, Kristian wanted to propose to his girlfriend Marijune who was visiting from the USA. He has been a long-time fan of Anúna and he wanted to ask her to marry him on the stage just after we sang a love song that was dedicated to her. I can describe it, but I think that all you need to do is look at Tommy Wiberg’s images below. They capture the moment in a way that words simply can’t.

Kristian and Marijune

That special moment…

Needless to say, the concert and the tour ended on a huge high for all of us.

My short story ends with a postscript. I received the photos only on Saturday last, and wrote to Kristian to see if he would mind me posting a note about his proposal. It turned out that he was actually in the USA and that tomorrow, Tuesday April 3rd, Kristian and Marijune will become Mr and Mrs Lejsund. Long life and happiness to you both. Thank you for including us in this wonderful moment of your lives. Have a fantastic day…

Finding my voice again…

When I was young, I used to open my mouth and sing. It was really simple. My brothers John and Tom and I sang so much that my parents just assumed that having three little boys harmonising in three parts was normal. What was odd was that while in school, and despite being involved in concerts and operettas, I never sang a solo. No-one ever noted that I had a particularly good voice,. When I went to College I should have registered as a singer, but instead chose to subject numerous unfortunate examiners to my piano expertise.

Having my singing ignored at school and later college had good and bad consequences. The good was that I wasn’t shoved down a path before I had any idea what singing was about. Ill informed “experts” never got hold of my voice, and believe me, there are many of them in Ireland. The bad was that I had no confidence in my singing. It took my work as a composer to push me forward into using my solo voice for the first time.

Whenever I had a solo to do, I became very flustered and nervous. I was aware that other singers around me could make a “big” noise, allowing them to attempt operatic arias and sing semi-professionally even at this early stage of their careers. At the time I believed that this “big voice” was correct, and that I was wrong. I heard people talking about passagio, and breaks and chest and ribs. None of it seemed to relate to what I was doing. I tried some singing teachers, but found no one that could explain to me what the hell was going on…The noise I made was small and restrained, even tight because I wouldn’t let it go. When I did, it wobbled and sounded ugly – out-of-control and unpleasant. It also made my face go purple. Around me I saw young singers with jaws wobbling, heads shaking and generally sounding like very old people. This appeared to be the only route forward for me – stick to my guns or have the voice of a 65 year old in the body of a 25 year old.

Then Anúna began to take off and I found that I had to sing solos. Since I wrote the songs it seemed logical to sing them, but often I avoided doing a solo, handing it to one of the singers to record instead of me. One example of this was the track “Island” which I wrote for Tenor solo, but ended up putting a soprano vocal on the first version of Deep Dead Blue simply because I had no confidence and I believed that I could not sing the solo well enough. I reinstated the solo to tenor much later, which I suppose means that I was eventually acknowledging that I wasn’t that bad.  It was cowardice to some extent. As I didn’t think that my voice was that good I honestly wanted to concentrate on the way the over all track sounded without letting my personal misgiving about my solo-singing get in the way.

Here is a performance I gave in 1999 of my song “Where All Roses Go” – you can see the effort it takes for me to sing quite clearly, although the result isn’t unpleasant.

My voice seemed to be able to survive on minimal technique despite shouting my way through rehearsals and then presenting and singing in concert. This lasted for a good long time – longer than it should have. Then in 2006 it began to fail. Something that was completely natural to me became unreliable. I continued recording and singing solo in concert, but even that began to falter, eventually leading me to sing no solos for full tours, and take literally weeks to sing a solo in studio. The latter was the worst of all. You can hear it particularly on the solo vocal of “Agnus Dei” on the Sanctus album by Anúna recorded in 2009. Strangely, it does no damage to the performance, and even adds a degree of strain that helps in the transmission of that composition…but it nearly tore me apart.

Then a friend told me to go and see Sylvia O Regan and get her to listen to my voice. I know Sylvia for decades. To cut a long story short, Sylvia found my voice. She told me that I had a very good voice, much to my surprise, and then proceeded to coax it back bit by bit. I had to travel back thirty years and proceed cautiously through a minefield of decades of bad habits and erroneous technique. That journey was long, but has resulted in my being able to sing again. I don’t sound exactly the same as I did. A bit older, a bit lower and darker. A lot wiser. Definitely stronger and capable of filling a large Hall unamplified if I work hard. If I don’t play by the rules, it lets me down. Now I know what the rules are for the first time, when my voice won’t work I know why.

Sylvia has a gift. She has the ability to transmit the precious information that she holds, which is the greatest gift of all. This she does in the simplest language. For her singing is breathing, and now that I can sing again, it feels like I am breathing properly for the very first time. You can see her in action in the Anúna Summer School video below. Thank you for everything Sylvia.