The Clifden Arts Festival in County Galway features visual arts, literature and live performances through next Saturday.
A musical adaptation of the traditional Latin Mass combines baroque with rock rhythms and jazz harmonies. Two choirs from the West of Ireland, Cantairí Chonamara and Cór Mhaigh Eo, unite for the Irish premiere of Lumières at St Joseph’s church in Clifden.
Musical Director Maura Ní Dhuibhir leads the ensemble for this first Irish performance of the 21st-century baroque mass. Former politician Joe McHugh performs a one-man play on learning Irish as Gaeltacht minister in 2014.
Maura Ní Dhuibhir shared “The composer himself said that he wanted this Mass to be uplifting, even to non believers. It’s a Mass that really stunned me when I heard it first, maybe 30 years ago. It’s very rarely performed, and it’s extremely rarely performed with full forces, in other words, with a choir, two solos and a small orchestra. The concert is intended to be uplifting and joyous.”
Brendan Flynn shared “This is a beautiful area, an extraordinary part of the world. It has inspired so many writers, painters, artists, musicians, people would travel here almost on a weekly basis to enjoy Conamara and Clifden and it’s only kind of natural for a festival to start bringing writers into the classroom, giving students a chance to experience the arts.”
So you may have AI which may be able to do all sorts of thing but nothing will beat the musician, the artist, the painter, the sculptor, the singer, the dancer, the poet, the songwriter, whatever.”
Cavanagh Foyle shared “I suppose, as an artist, when you make art, you never know who your art is going to connect with. So it has been fun to see people like Courtney Kardashian DM me, tell me my work is so cool and reposted. And David Beckham used my digital GIFs in his Instagram stories, and I’ve had Miley Cyrus also repost a few little artworks that I did. So, yeah, it’s been really cool, and it’s been nice to see it have an appeal, you know, globally.”
