IARLA Ó LIONÁIRD and Steve Cooney will play the first indoor gig in Galway since the end of the last year, when they appear at the Róisín Dubh this Saturday, July 10.
The Róisín Dubh has been chosen as one of the venues for the Government’s pilot concerts. There will be 80 tickets on sale for the event, with tables of two, four, and six available.
Directed by Government guidelines, the Róisín has implemented a range of control measures to ensure the protection and safety of performing artists, staff, and customers. The guidelines must be strictly followed by those attending this event.
“I am delighted the Róisín Dubh is participating in a series of pilot events being provided for by my Department,” said the Minister for Arts, Catherine Martin. “These events will help chart the road back to live entertainment, something we have all been missing during the last 16 months. The line-up of Iarla Ó Lionáird and Steve Cooney is fantastic, both so accomplished and inspiring. I know everyone at the event will have a fantastic evening.”
Iarla and Steve have explored their own individual paths in their careers – Iarla performing with the Afro Celt Sound System and the Gloaming, while Steve has performed in many Irish traditional instrumental ensembles and contributed to more than 250 albums as a guitarist, bass player, and producer.
Together they have forged a unique musical partnership over many years and their interpretations of songs from the sean-nós tradition have set a new standard of artistic integrity and creative innovation within the traditional structures of the Gaelic song tradition.
Ó Lionáird has been described as “one of the most dramatic voices in contemporary music,” by The Guardian. The Irish Times called his voice, “soft as a feather and as searingly sharp as a blade when the mood calls”, while Time Out said it is “as profound, simple and beautiful as wild horses”.
The late, great, Séámus Heaney said Steve Cooney’s guitar playing the musicianship “restores the ancient link between lyre and lyric, between poetry and performance, the rhapsody and rascality”. Martin Hayes declared, “he discovered a very unique rhythmic vocabulary that had never previously been heard on guitar in Irish music.”
Tickets for this event will be on sale through roisindubh.net from Monday July 5 at 10am.
