A complete recording of Beethoven’s Irish Songs, performed by staff, students and alumni of the DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama, has been released on the 5th of April, 2014, in the 200th anniversary year of their first publication in 1814.
(See Irish Times article, ‘Settling Old Scores’)
Beethoven’s arrangements of traditional Irish airs are for voice/s and piano, with optional violin and cello. The recording, featuring almost thirty performers, and 72 songs over 4 CDs (64 airs, with 8 of them arranged twice), is the first complete recording of the Irish Airs, using a new, chronological catalogue by Professor Barry Cooper of Manchester University, with his kind permission. The interesting aspect of this recording is the re-texting of most of the songs.
This recording, produced by the DIT Conservatory of Music and Drama, under the auspices of its Research Foundation for Music in Ireland, features artists Alison Browner (mezzo), Colette Boushell (soprano), Sinead Campbell-Wallace (soprano), Aoife O’Sullivan (soprano), Andrew Boushell (tenor), Eamon Mulhall (tenor), Lawrence Thackeray (tenor) and many up-and-coming young vocalists.
The pianists are all members of staff of the Conservatory’s Keyboard and Vocal departments, and the string parts are performed by Duo Chagall (violinist Gillian Williams and cellist Arun Rao, lecturers at the Conservatory). See the performers page for more details.
Release date: 5th April, 2014
Label: DIT CMD
Catalogue number: DITCMD002
A Note for Performers
The new performers’ edition of Beethoven’s Irish Songs Revisited will be published in the near future. Full notes on editorial decisions made will be included.
