Sean O Riada (1931-1971) was a major factor in the rise of Irish traditional music in the second half of the twentieth century. He is one of Ireland's most fascinating and significant characters--composer, musician (jazz, classical, and traditional), director of music for the Abbey Theatre, raconteur, film-maker, and academic--and the man most influential in changing the direction, and popularity, of traditional music that set the stage for the success of bands like The Chieftains and Planxty. In this wide-ranging account of his life and work a friend and colleague looks behind the mask O Riada held up to the world and reveals the complex personality of a unique individual, the first composer of modern Ireland.

It presents an investigation into the liturgical music of Sean and Peadar O Riada through an examination of three Roman-Rite mass settings composed in the Irish vernacular from within the cultural context of the West-Cork Gaeltacht of Muscrai. The main part of the work, running from Chapters Three to Six, consists of a detailed analysis of the contents of the mass settings, a body of material which is considered from the following perspectives: as emanating from a living culture of native traditional song; as part of a historical continuum of monophonic liturgical composition for the Roman Rite, having at its origins the compositional traditions of plainchant; as part of a broader aesthetic context of text-music relationships found in the repertoires of plainchant, medieval song and folksong; and finally, as part of the new liturgical reality existing since the Second Vatican Council which requires viable and sustainable musical approaches to the setting of vernacular texts.

"The Companion to Irish Traditional Music is not just the ideal reference for the interested enthusiast and session player, it also provides a unique resource for every library, school and home with an interest in the distinctive rituals, qualities and history of Irish traditional music and song."--BOOK JACKET.

Field Work is the record of four years during which Seamus Heaney left the violence of Belfast to settle in a country cottage with his family in Glanmore, County Wicklow. Heeding "an early warning system to get back inside my own head," Heaney wrote poems with a new strength and maturity, moving from the political concerns of his landmark volume North to a more personal, contemplative approach to the world and to his own writing. In Field Work he "brings a meditative music to bear upon fundamental themes of person and place, the mutuality of ourselves and the world" (Denis Donoghue, The New York Times Book Review).

This volume explores Irish rock's relationship to the wider world of international popular music through detailed analysis of the island's most prominent artists and bands such as U2, Van Morrison, Sinéad O'Connor, The Boomtown Rats, and Horslips - and key musical movements including the beat scene and the folk revival.

First Published in 1998. Irish traditional music is one of the richest treasuries of folk music in the world. Being an oral tradition, much of it has already been lost, and what has been recorded is only partially available in isolated collections. Until now, no composite picture has yet been presented, showing its remarkable range and diversity over four centuries. This volume covers Irish materials in general collections up to 1800 and in Irish collections up to and including Petrie's Ancient Music of Ireland (1855).The purposes of the project are to identify Irish dance tunes and songs; to present the scholar with a mass of material showing the evolution of the Irish vocal and instrumental folk style, period by period, from the earliest recorded tune up to the middle of the last century; to put into circulation many of the splendid airs which were lost but have now been located. Some 6,000 songs and dance tunes are presented, also including Scottish and English tunes. Included are Scottish tunes that were used by 18th-century Irish poets for their verses, and both English and Scottish tunes that are still current among Irish traditional musicians. Tunes of present-day currency which do not seem to be included may still be located by comparing their first 12 notes in the thematic index at the end of the volume.To make the vast array of material readily available, an index allows readers to locate a tune by its melodic incipit, by any of its titles, or by the first line of its text. Unfortunately, the vast majority of Irish songs noted up to the end of the last century lack texts, since the collectors were ignorant of the Irish language. But almost every other facet is covered-provenance, tonality structure, and variants.