Irish Times Notes
Church of Ireland Notes from 'The Irish Times'
Saturday 6 August 2011
One of the best established of the Irish summer festivals is Kilkenny Arts Week which is now underway and, as always, there is a significant Church of Ireland input.
Yesterday (Friday) evening in St Canice’s Cathedral, Eric Sweeney, the Organist of Waterford Cathedral, joined 3epkano to perform a live score to the silent movie, The Cabinet of Dr Caligari. The Cathedral will again be the venue this evening (Saturday) for a performance of Baroque masterpieces by the Irish Baroque Orchestra and the choir, Resurgam, directed by Mark Duley, Organist and Choir Master of St Nicholas’ Collegiate Church, Galway. Later in the week, on Friday, there will be a lunchtime recital in St Canice’s by the Venetian pianist, Alessandro Taverna, and an evening concert of piano duets by Rebecca and Kirsten Capova.
Outside of the world of classical music for which the cathedral’s acoustic is well suited, St Canice’s will also host folk music with Donal Lunney, Danish songwriter, Agnes Obei, and Irish singer-songwriter, James Vincent McMorrow, among others. This evening (Saturday) Morgan O’Kelly, Professor of Economics in UCD, will give the Hubert Butler Lecture which was established in 2007 to honour the Kilkenny writer, historian and broadcaster whose remarkable consistency of vision and clarity of mind made him unique among essayists and whose work evinced an unsurpassed moral, political and literary integrity.
For those who simply want to absorb the atmosphere of Ireland’s largest inland town, the Church of Ireland has much to offer and, in particular, the Cathedral Close, makes a pleasant walk. The Cathedral, largely 13th century, is the second largest in Ireland with the largest and finest collection of medieval monuments in the country, and the adjacent round tower, the earliest extant structure in Kilkenny, is a century older. The former bishop’s palace, now the headquarters of the Heritage Council, also has medieval origins and incorporates some of the remains of the palace of the 14th century Anglo-Norman Bishop of Ossory, Richard Ledred. With the 17th century Library, 18th century Deanery, and the related buildings the close is a remarkable survival of a once much larger ecclesiastical community. A conservation plan for the cathedral and the close is in preparation and its publication should point the way for a new phase in the life of this most important group of buildings.
The choir of St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, directed by Stuart Nicholson, has begun a short tour in England where they will sing services in both St Philip’s Cathedral, Birmingham, and the Cathedral of St Peter and the Holy and Indivisible Trinity, Gloucester. In St Patrick’s there will be lunchtime recitals today (Saturday) by the Common Time Music Studio and on Monday by the Holy Rosary School Choir from South Africa,
Tomorrow (Sunday) in St Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick, the morning Eucharist and Evensong will be sung by the choir of All Saints Church, Carshalton, Surrey, directed by Daniel Battle. In Co Monaghan there will be an Open Air Service at St Molua’s Church, Magheracloone, where the rector is the Revd Robert Kingston. The preacher will be the Revd Dr Adrian Empey, Chaplaincy Coordinator for the Missions to Seafarers in Dublin Port.
On Monday the Grampian Concert Orchestra will give a lunchtime recital in Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin, and on Wednesday evening the Cologne Philarmonic will give a concert in St Mary’s Church, Killarney.
The St Barrahane’s Church Festival of Music continues in Castletownshend, Co. Cork, on Thursday evening with a concert of traditional music by The Listeners.