In the Lyric Feature on RTÉ lyric fm at 6 pm on Sunday July 1st, American pianist Guy Livingston explores the influence of Ireland and Irish music on the work of American composer Henry Cowell in the award-winning documentary The Banshee and The Tiger - listen to it above.
Henry Cowell (1897-1965) was a radical American composer whose inventive techniques changed American music and influenced the generations of composers which followed, including his former student John Cage. His extrovert playing, which involved bashing clusters of notes with his fists and arms, or plucking the piano strings, enthralled audiences and appalled many critics.
Here’s presenter Guy Livingston demonstrating Cowell’s tone clusters:
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Henry Cowell also had a life-long interest in world music which began in his childhood and continued later in life when he and his wife, ethnomusicologist Sidney Robertson Cowell, travelled extensively. Sidney also played a key role in getting him released from prison following a scandal.
In The Banshee and the Tiger, presenter and pianist Guy Livingston explores the influence of Ireland and Irish music on the work of Henry Cowell, with contributions from biographer Joel Sachs, American pianist Sarah Cahill, Irish traditional music researcher Deirdre Ní Conghaile, and American mezzo soprano Aylish Kerrigan.
The programme contains archive recordings of Cowell talking about his music and approach to composition. We also hear some of the rare recordings which Sidney made in the Aran Islands in the 1950s, and even rarer recordings made by Henry Cowell in 1934, including what is believed to be the earliest recording ever made of keening.
The Banshee and the Tiger, RTÉ lyric fm, Sunday 1st July 2018 at 18:00.
Photo: Mia Brest, via Collection of the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Picture used by permission of the David and Sylvia Teitelbaum Fund Inc.
