Pictured: Macdara Ó Faoláin who will feature on a live Studio 8 session on Aedín in the Afternoon, Friday 31st January from 1-4pm.
OPERA NIGHT WITH PAUL HERRIOTT
The Metropolitan Opera New York presents Verdi's Aida
Soprano Angel Blue makes her long-awaited Met role debut as the Ethiopian princess torn between love and country, one of opera's defining roles. Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin takes the podium for Michael Mayer's spectacular new staging, which brings audiences inside the towering pyramids and gilded tombs of ancient Egypt with intricate projections and dazzling animations. Mezzo-soprano Judit Kutasi, following her 2024 debut in Verdi's La Forza del Destino, is Aida's Egyptian rival Amneris, and tenor Piotr Beczala is the soldier Radamès, completing opera's greatest love triangle. The all-star cast also features baritone Quinn Kelsey as Amonasro and bass Dmitry Belosselskiy as Ramfis.
RTÉ lyric fm, Saturday 25th January, 7pm-10.40pm
Photo | Ken Howard
VESPERTINE WITH ELLEN CRANITCH
I'll be wearing my kilt this Saturday to celebrate the birthday of the great and beloved Scottish poet, Robert Burns. Music from Mhairi Hall, Peatbog Faeries, Aly Bain, Ian Carr and Annie Lennox. A Burns night full of poetry, music and song, and not a haggis in sight. Join me if you can.
RTÉ lyric fm, Saturday 25th January, 10.40pm (please note later start time)
VOX NOSTRA WITH VLAD SMISHKEWYCH
The warm tone and sonorous sounds of the historic piano are sustained through this morning's Vox Nostra. With the 270th birth anniversary of Muzio Clementi, composer and piano developer and builder, on this day in 1752 and Mozart's own birthday following on a few days later, it's a perfect Sunday to celebrate the fortepiano in all its forms. The Sunday Sonata features Mozart's piano concerto in C major KV 387b, premiered this week in Vienna back in 1783, and we'll get to hear the sounds of early pianos from the medieval clavisimbalum all the way to historic pianos played by the Schumanns, Brahms, and Liszt.
RTÉ lyric fm, Sunday 26th January, 7am-10am
THE LYRIC FEATURE
The Golden Museum
The children of immigrants often grow up co-existing in parallel worlds. While they can be immersed in all aspects of their parent's culture and identify strongly with that heritage they can also feel fully at home in the country of their birth.
In 'The Golden Museum', J.J. O'Shea reflects on his experience as the child of Irish immigrants in London in the mid-twentieth century. The story is told through interweaving threads of original music and song, poetry and commentary by J.J. and members of his extended family.
The long summer holidays spent on the family farm in Ireland before returning to London for the school year play a central part in the story as we are given glimpses of life in rural Kerry and in London in the 1950s, '60s and '70s as viewed through the eyes of a growing child. The contributors explore different aspects of the immigrant experience. How did they respond to life in Ireland and their Irish cousins? What did their Irish cousins make of them? How did the experience impinge on their notions of 'home' and 'identity'?
Original music and songs composed by J.J. O`Shea are performed by Reidun Schlesinger (harp), Paul de Grae (acoustic and electric guitar) and Barry Lynch (tin whistle and bodhrán) and sung by Sadhbh Nic Fhloinn and Emma Langford. Paula Meehan reads excerpts from her poems 'Invocation' 'You Open Your Hand' and 'Daughters of Memory.'
Presented and Produced by J.J. O'Shea
Producer for RTÉ lyric fm: Eoin O Kelly
A J.J. O'Shea production funded by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland from the Television Licence Fee. (First broadcast - 25th December 2022)
RTÉ lyric fm, Sunday 26th January, 6pm-7pm
Photo | JJ O'Shea
THE FULL SCORE WITH LIZ NOLAN
We're celebrating the National String Quartet Foundation all this week on The Full Score. The Foundation creates and sponsors projects which bring live chamber music to audiences throughout Ireland. It is committed to supporting Irish and Irish-based musicians who wish to explore the string quartet repertoire and presents around eighty concerts each year given by a wide variety of string quartets, all of them with Irish connections.
In today's concert we'll hear Ireland's longest established string quartet, the ConTempo Quartet, founded in Bucharest in 1995 and based in Ireland since 2003. Mozart's D major quartet K.499 is one of the lesser played but its ingeniously intertwined lines create a fascinating and absorbing sound world. Raymond Deane is one of our most celebrated composers and we'll hear the first performances of his seventh string quartet. Dobrinka Tabakova's playful quartet On a bench in the shade takes its inspiration from 'hot summers days, when people gather to talk in the shade'. Beethoven's C major Razumovsky quartet completes the programme, its sparklingly virtuosic outer movements contrasting with a moody funeral march and a quaintly old-fashioned minuet.
Mozart: String Quartet in D major K.499
Raymond Deane: String Quartet No.7
Dobrinka Tabakova: On a bench in the shade
Beethoven: String Quartet in C major Op.59 No.3 Razumovsky
ConTempo Quartet
Bogdan Sofei, violin
Ingrid Nicola, violin
Andreea Banciu, viola
Adrian Mantu, cello
RTÉ lyric fm, Monday 27th January, 1pm-4pm
RTÉ LYRIC LIVE: Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition Final
Paul Herriott and Liz Nolan present the final of the 10th Veronica Dunne International Singing Competition live from the National Concert Hall. Six of the most talented competitors from around the world will sing three arias with the National Symphony Orchestra before the international jury decide on this year's winner of this prestigious vocal competition.
National Symphony Orchestra
Wyn Davies, conductor
RTÉ lyric fm, Tuesday 28th January, 7pm-9pm
NIALL CARROLL’S CLASSICAL DAYTIME
Niall Carroll plays music from the heart of the classical repertoire with Sounds on Screen a piece from either the big or the small screen at 11am, and at midday Five of a Kind. This week Niall chooses five pieces by the Hungarian composer and music educator Zoltan Kodaly.
RTÉ lyric fm, Wednesday 29th January, 10am-1pm
THE FULL SCORE WITH LIZ NOLAN
We're celebrating the National String Quartet Foundation all this week on The Full Score. The Foundation creates and sponsors projects which bring live chamber music to audiences throughout Ireland. It is committed to supporting Irish and Irish-based musicians who wish to explore the string quartet repertoire and presents around eighty concerts each year given by a wide variety of string quartets, all of them with Irish connections.
The Banbha Quartet brings together four of Ireland's finest musicians and is one of a new generation of string quartets nurtured by the National String Quartet Foundation. In today's Full Score concert they present popular masterpieces by Beethoven and Schubert alongside a new work by Donegal fiddler turned renowned composer Seán Doherty. Inspired by the mix of Irish and Polish musicians in the Banbha Quartet, Sean's latest string quartet celebrates the Mazurka, originally a Polish folk dance, made famous by Chopin's piano works and also incorporated into the Donegal fiddle tradition.
Beethoven: String Quartet in F minor Op.95
Seán Doherty: Varsouviana - Variations on Shoe the Donkey
Schubert: String Quartet in D minor Death and the Maiden
Banbha Quartet
Lidia Jewloszewicz-Clarke, violin
Maria Ryan, violin
Séamus Hickey, viola
Aoife Burke, cello
RTÉ lyric fm, Wednesday 29th January, 1pm-4pm
MARTY IN THE MORNING
Join Marty as he takes the chill out of your early mornings with music, news, weather and travel updates.
RTÉ lyric fm, Thursday 30th January, 7am-10am
AEDÍN IN THE AFTERNOON
A live Studio 8 session with Macdara Ó Faoláin who is a young bouzouki player from An Rinn, Co Waterford, renowned for his innovative approach to traditional Irish music, named last year as the Young Musician of the Year by TG4. He will join Aedín for some tunes and chat.
RTÉ lyric fm, Friday 31st January, 1pm-4pm
RTÉ LYRIC LIVE WITH PAUL HERRIOTT
Paul Herriott presents live from the stage of the National Concert Hall as the National Symphony Orchestra perform Rachmaninov's Second Symphony, one of the great orchestral love songs. There is an Irish Premiere of Stephen McNeff's song cycle The Celestial Stranger, composed for Gavan Ring.
Debussy: Prélude à l'après-midi d'une faune
Stephen McNeff: The Celestial Stranger (Irish Premiere -
NSO co-commission with BBC National Orchestra of Wales)
Rachmaninov: Symphony No. 2
National Symphony Orchestra
Lina González-Granados (conductor)
Gavan Ring (tenor)
RTÉ lyric fm, Friday 31st January, 7pm-10pm
