Two top guitarists will be performing at the Linenhall Arts Centre in Castlebar in the coming weeks. On Thursday September 23 at 8pm, American fingerstyle guitarist Richard Gilewitz presents his acclaimed show Acoustic Adventures, a dazzling and illuminating excursion through European, contemporary and Spanish classical works to the traditional, folk, blues, and American primitive eras. Acoustic Adventures is a journey into the past and present realm of the guitar, a sound tunnel of timeless musical history that has received standing ovations around the globe. And, boy, can he play.
And on Monday October 4 at 8pm, the acclaimed Dakota Dave Hull brings his infectious, uniquely personal, blend of jazz, ragtime, folk, blues, western swing and vintage pop to the Linenhall. Beyond the sheer technical virtuosity, Dakota Dave’s performances are also great fun, full of heart, and a love for the music he delivers so well. Go on down for a great evening of roots guitar and find out what everyone is talking about.
Seán Tyrrell’s Message of Peace
Galway troubadour Seán Tyrrell presents Message of Peace, a highly engaging evening of musical theatre at the Linenhall Arts Centre in Castlebar on Monday September 27 at 8pm.
Message of Peace tells the amazing story of a lesser-known Irish hero John Boyle O’Reilly: Visionary, poet, rebel, freedom fighter, and civil rights activist. Veteran singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Seán Tyrrell traces O’Reilly’s journey from early childhood set against a backdrop of famine, revolution, fenianism, and penal servitude, to life in Australia and his great escape from there to the USA, weaving effortlessly through narrative, instrumental, and song as he traces O’Reilly’s colourful life.
Since the 1960s, Seán Tyrrell has been a potent musical presence on the folk/trad scene, with a string of acclaimed CDs and collaborative projects to his name, including The Orchard, Cry of a Dreamer, and The Midnight Court. A double CD of Message of Peace was released last year.
Rory Breslin sculpture exhibition at the Linenhall
Some Attachments and Severance, an exciting exhibition of bronze sculptures and drawings by Mayo-based sculptor Rory Breslin, continues at the Linenhall Arts Centre in Castlebar for the month of September. Though Breslin’s exquisitely executed works are based in figurative realism, the tensions and disfigurements within them create uneasy viewing, often evoking the classical man/monster myths of antiquity. Breslin’s skill resides in his capacity to balance orthodox representation with at times a voracious and rich subconscious. A former lecturer in NCAD, and co-founder of the Head Sculpture Gallery in Dublin, Rory Breslin has had numerous solo drawing and sculpture exhibitions, both nationally and further afield, and has executed a large body of public commissions.
World cinema kicks of Linenhall film club run
Linenhall Film Club’s autumn season kicks off on Tuesday September 16 with the tender and human Japanese drama Still Walking. Centring on a lower middle class Yokohama family, on the day they come together to observe the anniversary of a loss in the family, a grown-up son and daughter return for a rare family reunion. Grief provides a quiet backdrop in this subtle, entrancing, and beautifully observed exploration of what makes modern families tick, by director Hirokazu Koreeda.
