Tag Archives: glor

CLOSE to one million people have attended over 8,000 performances in glór, which this weekend celebrates its 21st birthday. On Saturday, the Ennis cultural venue celebrates 21 years in business and in that time has welcomed 950,000 people to over 8,200 ticketed performances and events. To celebrate reaching its milestone birthday, glór is collaborating with broadcaster and producer Áine Hensey to present a 21st birthday concert this weekend. This Saturday, a generation of younger Clare musicians and performers will take to the glór stage this Saturday to echo the opening night performance and to celebrate in true Clare style. The anniversary concert will once again raise the roof and feature a host of special guests from Clare and beyond, celebrating our creative community through music, dance, and word. The concert will also feature just some of the many recent collaborations that glór is very proud of. Compered by Therese McInerney, the concert will feature some of Clare’s finest musicians and …

IF you’re looking for something fun to do during the cold winter months, you certainly won’t be barking up the wrong tree by getting involved with the Ennis Musical Society. Auditions for the society’s newest show Legally Blonde are set to take part this Sunday from 3pm at the Holy Family Hall with would-be singers and actors aged 16 and over encouraged to get involved. However, it isn’t just stars of the two legged variety who will be taking part in the show, with society chairperson Rachael Culligan revealing they will shortly be looking for performers of the four-legged kind. “Once we have cast the human parts we will be seeking dogs to audition for two roles in the show. We want to make sure that the dogs work well with who they are on stage with. “We are going to be looking for one small and one big dog, in the movie there is a Chihuahua, but what it …

GLÓR’S director Orla Flanagan will be stepping down from her role in the new year the venue’s chair and board have announced. After six years at the helm of the Ennis cultural venue, Ms Flanagan is set pursue her own artistic interests and to embark on new creative projects. She has been appointed as senior producer for Once Off Productions and said she intends to remain living in Clare. “I am very proud of what we have achieved in glór over the past six years,” Ms Flanagan commented. “I will really miss the great staff, supportive board and our fantastic partners and artists as well as the buzz of the events and the vibrancy of the building. “I am especially proud of our collaborations with a range of artists and projects as well as the many exceptional artists celebrated and featured as part of the MÓRglór Award.” She said she is looking forward to working with a wide range of …

THE story of the life of Ernest Shackleton and the legendary voyage of the HMS Endurance on its expedition to cross the Antarctic continent is being told as part of a new show in glór this weekend marking the centenary of the explorer’s death. County Kildare Orchestra presents ‘South! Always South’, a concert commemorating the death 100 years ago this year of Irish explorer Shackleton. The performance, on Saturday, November 12 in the Ennis venue, is a new work composed by fellow Kildare native and traditional musician Brian Hughes who performs uilleann pipes and whistle, accompanied by the County Kildare Orchestra and conductor Lorcan Daly. Shackleton was born in Kilkea near Athy, and had already gained a reputation for courage and leadership on previous Antarctic expeditions. However, what started as a great geographic and scientific adventure turned into a dramatic rescue mission when the Endurance became trapped in the ice floes in the Weddell Sea, and sank. Over the following …

CLARE musician Aisling Lyons is in line for two prizes at a prestigious national awards ceremony next week. The harper has been nominated for this year’s RTÉ Radio 1 Folk Awards in both the Best Folk Instrumentalist and Best Emerging Artist categories. The Folk Awards night will be in Vicar Street Dublin on Thursday, November 17. The following night Aisling will perform with Sean Lyons and Dermot Sheedy in Glór premiering their new work ‘Merfolk’ which has been a collaborative project developed by Glór and Creative Ireland Clare.  Aisling who also plays concertina, performs alongside Seán on vocals/guitar/uilleann pipes/whistles and Dermot on bodhrán/percussion at the Ennis venue. The three began playing together in 2021 and have refined a folk sound that is deeply-rooted in tradition yet brimming with originality. Focusing primarily on the traditions of music and song in County Clare, their music displays a reverence for the past as well as a willingness to embrace modern influences and international …

CLASSICAL duo John O’Conor and Ailbhe McDonagh join forces to bring an intimate evening of cello and piano music to Ennis this week. World renowned Beethoven specialist O’Conor and Irish cello soloist Ailbhe McDonagh celebrated Beethoven’s 250th anniversary year in 2021 by recording a double album of his complete sonatas for cello and piano. And this Thursday, October 6, they will bring their nationwide tour showcasing their partnership to glór. On the night they will be performing sonatas by Beethoven and some shorter works by Faurè, Chopin and McDonagh herself including the world premiere of Valentia composed specially for this tour. O’Conor has been gathering wonderful reviews for his masterly playing for over 40 years with the Chicago Tribune saying, “He represents a vanishing tradition that favours inner expression and atmosphere over showmanship and bravura”. He studied in his native Dublin, in Vienna with Dieter Weber, and was tutored by the legendary Wilhelm Kempff. His unanimous First Prize at the …

A BRAND new festival with a vision to create engaging, inclusive and innovative participatory art projects will take place in Ennis in October. PIMA! Fest, (Participate in Music and Arts) is produced by Music Generation Clare in association with glór and local community partners and artists and will be held from October 15 to 16. In times of great challenge a wave of creative outpouring emerges in society and as participatory arts takes a more significant role in the arts globally, Music Generation Clare sees an opportunity to contribute to the development of this emerging space with the creation of a new annual festival for Ennis and County Clare. Speaking ahead of PIMA! FEST said, “We started developing the concept of PIMA! Fest in early 2021, when we saw on the horizon a great need for communities to be together again in a meaningful way, in particular opportunities for our young musicians to play together and collaborate on projects together. …

AN IMMERSIVE and powerful experience of drumming and percussion is on offer to young people at Glor on next month. Percussion virtuosos, Bangers and Crash, will bring their global palette of rhythmic influences, from Afro-Cuban and Japanese taiko to Spanish flamenco and Javanese gamelan to Ennis on Sunday, October 16. Bangers and Crash include some of Ireland’s finest percussionists, featuring Alex Petcu-Colan, Emma King, Catríona Frost, Brian Dungan, Patrick Lynch and John Rousseau-Parlane. This is the first event to be announced as part of PIMA Fest! ’22. It will see the six members of Bangers and Crash Percussion Sextet collaborate on a unique immersive concert that invites the public t participate. “We are inviting audiences to enhance the musical experience, to join us at various high points and transitions, adding drama, dynamics, colour and atmosphere to the music,” audience to participate in their music, adding an atmospheric ‘surround sound’ to the concert. said Alex Petcu-Colan. “This is purely optional though. …