Roscommon Arts Centre Hosts A celebration of Count John McCormack Sept 17

"McCormack and Kreisler - an Homage" will be performed by Scottish tenor Nicky Spence together with Irish violinist Elizabeth Cooney and pianist Michael Joyce in Roscommon Arts Centre at 8.00pm on Saturday 17 September. This is part of a concert tour to Roscommon, Limerick and DunLaoghaire presented with a Music Network Performance and Touring Award.

McCormack and Kreisler performed and recorded together over many years in both the UK and USA and their friendship lasted until McCormack's death. This programme is an homage both to the repertoire of these great musicians and to their close musical relationships. It includes duets performed regularly by McCormack and Kreisler together with piano; pieces either composed or arranged by Kreisler and songs that McCormack sang with either Edwin Schneider or Vincent O'Brien at the keyboard. A piece that the musicians thought would complement the programme nicely is Anach Cuan, arranged by John Gibson, living Cork composer. It is a very lyrical piece evoking the tragedy of 1828 when 17 people died in a boating accident on the Corrib in Galway.

Praised recently in the Daily Telegraph for possessing ‘a tenor voice of real distinction', Nicky Spence's recent concert performances include a Britten Song-Cycle Series in Aldeburgh and at Kings Place London, world premiere performances at the Wigmore Hall and the Royal Festival Hall, and Britten's Serenade for Tenor, Horn & Strings with L'Orchestre National d'Ile de France under Gordan Nikolic. A graduated of the Guildhall School of Music & Drama, he went on to study at the National Opera Studio before joining London Coliseum as a Young Artist with the English National Opera. This last year marked a run of successful debuts for Nicky in Opera Holland Park, Opera North, Scottish Opera and with English National Opera. To hear a sample from the programme, see www.nickyspence.com launch audio player and click on Donizetti.

Elizabeth Cooney has performed as soloist with a number of European orchestras with conductors Alexander Anissimov, Paavo Jarvi, Shlomo Mintz, Howard Shelley, Valdimir Altschuler and Laurent Wagner and is a regular soloist with the National Symphony Orchestra, the RTE Concert Orchestra and the Ulster Orchestra in Ireland. She has played with many distinguished partners in the West Cork Chamber Music Festival, the Wigmore Hall, the Royal Festival Hall, Victoria Hall, Geneva and the Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie in New York. She recently performed as soloist in the Cork Opera House Reich Effect.

Michael Joyce has performed as a collaborative pianist in recitals throughout Ireland and internationally at venues including the Casa da Musica in Porto and St James' Piccadilly and Wigmore Hall in London. He has performed with singers Pauline Tinsley, Mary Hegarty and Edel O'Brien, violist Nobuko Imai, violinists Catherine Leonard, Keith Pascoe and Héloïse Geoghegan, cellist Gerard Peregrine, flautist Sabine Ducrot and pianist Ciara Moroney. Michael currently lives in Cork where he freelances and works as a lecturer and accompanist at CIT Cork School of Music.

Tickets €15 (€12 concession) from Roscommon Arts Centre's box office 090 66 25824.

Programme:

Gounod - Ave Maria
Granada - Lara
Donizetti - Una Furtiva Lagrima (L'Elisir d'Amore)
R. Strauss - Morgen Op.27 No.4
Kreisler - Caprice Viennois
Liebesleid
Tambourin Chinois
Ponce - Estrellita
Kreisler - The Old Refrain
Godard - Angels Guard Thee
Sullivan - The Lost Chord
Quilter - Now sleeps the crimson petal
Rachmaninov - Oh Never Sing to me Again
Brahms arr. Kreisler - Hungarian Dance No.17
Schubert - Ave Maria
Rossini - La Danza; Funiculi Funicula
Dvorak arr. Kreisler - Slavonic Fantasy
Trad. arr. John Gibson - Anach Cuan
Trad. Danny Boy

Abbey Theatre to tour Ireland with Carmel Winters' ‘B for Baby'
~ Fourteen Irish venues to host the award winning production ~
The Abbey Theatre, Ireland's National Theatre, is delighted to announce the nationwide tour of Carmel Winters' much applauded production of B for Baby from August to November of this year. Directed by Mikel Murfi, the first stage of the B for Baby tour started on Thursday 4 August in the Tampere Theatre Festival in Finland. From there the tour returned to Ireland to begin the nationwide run, covering the length and breadth of Ireland, taking in fourteen venues in total. These include theatres in Meath, Laois, Louth, Kerry, Antrim, Donegal, Sligo, Waterford, Carlow, Wicklow, Longford, Cork, Galway, Dublin and of course, Roscommon with a performance at Roscommon Arts Centre on Friday 30th September and Saturday 1st October, 8pm.

Fiach Mac Conghail, Artistic Director of The Abbey Theatre said, "I am extremely proud that The Abbey Theatre is undertaking a nationwide tour of B FOR BABY by Carmel Winters. B FOR BABY is an award winning production and is testament to Carmel Winters' talent as an exciting new playwright. It is vital for The Abbey Theatre to produce new work and to tour nationally and internationally. As The National Theatre we continue to work to extend the life-span of a new play, highlighted by the success of Mark O'Rowe's TERMINUS which recently finished a 99 date tour in Sydney, Australia.

B FOR BABY stars Louis Lovett (B and Brian) and Michele Moran (D and Mrs C) who showcase their acting talents in playing two roles each. In the play, Mrs C wants a baby and not a Christmas tree. B wants a real hairdressers' scissors and a wife. D wants a snow globe and a ‘big head of dirty auld curls'. All of them want their own place in the world. And if they can't find it, they'll create one of their own. Join B and D in the care home where they are residents, and where Mrs C is a carer, on their special - ‘very fecking special' - journey towards happiness.

Winner of The Irish Times Best New Play award in 2010, B FOR BABY has been described by The Sunday Times as "a solid evening's entertainment" and by The Telegraph as a ‘wonderful bundle of perturbing laughs'.

B FOR BABY was Carmel Winters' first play at The Abbey Theatre and her first full-length play to be professionally produced. Originally commissioned by Theatre Lovett, set and costume design is by Sabine Dargent and lighting design by Paul Keogan. The Abbey Theatre acknowledges the financial support of the Arts Council and Culture Ireland.

http://www.roscommonartscentre.ie/

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