Review Sunday, June 14, 2009 Reviewed by Dick O'Riordan Various Artists
Louth Sounds, €15
Available from Tower Records and www.louthcms.org
Since its formation in 2006, the Louth Contemporary Music Society has carved a very effective and identifiable niche for itself in Irish music, and by its achievements in attracting world-class performers such as Arvo Purt , Joanna McGregor and Terry Riley.
The society’s first compilation of various works by composers past and present forms a spiritual landscape embracing the mystical and the meditative.
Irish musicians, playing with compelling beauty, perform all of the works on this CD. The players include the Callino Quartet, violinist Ioana Petcu-Colan, pianist Michael McHale, flautist Vourneen Ryan and percussionist Stephen Kelly. There is also some exquisite singing of ethereal quality by soprano Patricia Rozario.
Although it is difficult to single out any particular items in this collection, Part’s Hymn to a Great City - an uplifting two-piano tribute to New York - knocked me back through the purity of sound achieved by the overlapping of two separate recording tracks by McHale.
This young award-winning Belfast pianist has an intuitive feel for music, and can cross musical boundaries effortlessly. Petcu-Colan plays again with McHale in a world premiere recording of Valentin Silvestrov’s 25 X 1893, a harrowingly exquisite, lullaby like tribute tribute to Tchaikovsky.
Other composers covered include Tavener, Knaifel, Górecki and Cage. AP lace Between is an instantly appealing CD whose hidden beauties and depths are revealed through repeated listening.
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