Our latest RTÉ Culture Tune of the Week comes all the way from Cuba, but with a very Irish and very summer 2020 feel. So from one island to another, listen to Irish Landscape in the Rain by Cuban composer Leo Brouwer.
Eamonn Quinn of Louth Contemporary Music Society,a powerhouse of a promoter and festival head, who brings major artists and composers from around the world to Louth throughout the year, writes about the track.
Had times been normal, the veteran Cuban guitarist-composer Leo Brouwer would have been featured artist at this year's midsummer weekend festival put on by the Louth Contemporary Music Society. But times are not, and the festival has, of course, to be cancelled.
Yet the music goes on. If there was no way for four guitarists to get together to play the piece commissioned for the festival, and no way for an audience to assemble in Dundalk to hear it, Irish Landscape with Rain has been brought to life by electronic means for a limitless public performance.
The internationally renowned Irish guitarist Alec O’Leary has multitracked a recording available on Bandcamp, Spotify and other digital stores. Irish Landscape with Rain turns out to be a charming greeting conveyed from one island to another.
The Irish landscape is there, perhaps, in a snatch of a tune, the rain in the plink-plink-plink of repeated notes. Cuban rhythms play along with this, sending bright Caribbean sunshine through the drizzle to make pure musical rainbows.
