Frank Corcoran

DUBLIN CITY GALLERY THE HUGH LANE

SUNDAYS @ NOON CONCERT SERIES

ADMISSION FREE

Sunday January 13th 2008

Callino Quartet

Frank Corcoran String Quartet No. 3 (2007) première

Gyorgy Kurtag Officium Breve In Memoriam Andreæ Szervánszky Op. 28

L. van Beethoven Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 74, “The Harp:”

Pre-concert talk 11.30am:
Frank Corcoran will speak about his new string quartet.

The Callino Quartet is an internationally successful string quartet formed in 1999. They regularly broadcast on Lyric FM and BBC Radio 3 and have also appeared several times on RTE television. They have toured in Norway and Holland several times and also appeared at festivals in Lithuania, Italy, Czech Republic, and have also performed several times in Canada.The Callino Quartet was awarded a Special Prize at the 2002 Paulo Borciani String Quartet Competition for their performance of Haydn and since then has enjoyed collaborations with such diverse artists as the Vanbrugh, Vogler and Belcea String Quartets, double-bassist Edgar Meyer, pianist Barry Douglas, the Paris-Bastille Wind Octet and jazz guitarist John Abercrombie.The Quartet has commissioned and premiered new works by Ian Wilson, Raymond Deane and Finnish composer Kimmo Hakola and worked closely with Edgar Meyer, Peteris Vasks and Franghiz Ali-Zadeh on their works for string quartet. Recent and forthcoming performances include appearances at the Cheltenham, Sligo New Music and Clandeboye Festivals, concert tours of Scotland as winners of the Tunnell Trust Award, concerts in Ireland and the U.K. and a Wigmore Hall debut performance. Earlier this year they released their first commercial CD of works by Irish composer Ian Wilson to great critical acclaim. The Callino Quartet’s own annual festival takes place over the Easter Weekend in Co. Cork, Ireland. http://www.callinoquartet.com/

For further information contact
Gavin O’Sullivan
ph: +353-87-2456971
email: gmusic@indigo.ie
address: DUBLIN CITY GALLERY HUGH LANE, PARNELL SQ., DUBLIN 1, IRELAND. Website: www.hughlane.ie

The Sundays @ Noon Concert Series is funded by Dublin City Council and grant aided by The Arts Council/ An Chomhairle Ealaíon.

So what´s so awful ? Sort, sort out, sift. I always HATED the smell of that book´s paper. Out ! Here´s a last chance to ask why many socks hoarded and hotel bathroom-soap hoarded, bank-statements from before the Flood stashed in the well-thumbed Koran that props up the bed in which it all happened, why the piano-stool never quite satisfied, how anyone was expected to thread his dish-stacker´s way through the scullery.
Life is ” a continuous house-move” . Moan we have not here a lasting apartment, no : so what´s awful in popping junk and detritus into the mouse-dropping grey-brown boxes, then loading them up on, down off the two trucks, long-forgotten muscles bemoaning their abuse ?
You can´t be thinking you simply walk away from the trousers out of which you´ve stalked? ( Well I did, I´d intend, each awful time, simply to turn the key in the flat – from the outside – walk off and then tip-off the Removal Police anonymously . Take a tin of herrings in cream, eleven years hidden under the uncompleted manuscript of the traveller´s Symphonic Moan for Soprano and Lush Strings.
To be is to be moving. To exist is to move the muck continuously through one´s intimate, comfy chronosphere ? To die, to sleep ? Music, please . Trundle, carriers, a Baroque array of mouse-dropping brown cartons, insulting, ineptly edited, conceived and boring books which boring guests brought as boring birthday -gifts. It´s not that, getting out of this too loud apartment and into that aerial flat of bliss. O Prime Mover, pity the moved ! Move us moving. Move us on. Move on.
Only the snail is sure that it´s moving house it is up to . What I move is the outer wrappings and the armour-plate and epidermic accoutrements, a few sloughed – off layers of lived, chronospherical mystery.
1. Considering Lord Buddha or San Francesco, I´ll have to bring up the songbirds of Tipperary . They do not weep, they never sow nor weave nor clutter.
2. Consider : if possessing the luminously new eyrie is new life, relinquishing the old can soberly be seen as a small rehearsal of its thankfully now no longer occupant´s death.
3. Of such detritus is the house-mover´s past. Who´se beginning to sing : ” Neither a collector nor a consumer be”, O Prime Mover !
4. This complaining squirrel´s taste ran to chipped mugs and hairy cookery books and there were the twelve chamber-pots which father deemed prudent to hoard in the first cold winter of the Second World War. In case we´d run out.
it is tensed temporality we celebrate on this grey morning of these removal-vans and striding furniture-carriers , our dresser walzing back down the stairs. The Reapers. The kitchen-sink dismantlers. The great apes , the Black and White Friars. The schleppers . The levellers. Move it on. Move on. Move.

Dec. 12 2007

Ireland House, New York : FRANK CORCORAN – AN ” IRISH ” COMPOSER ?

Dec. 29 2007 Norddeutscher Rundfunk 3.

Frank Corcoran´s radiophonic 2 – hours ” Hear – Analysis ” of

Mozart´s G Minor Symphony , Nr. 40.

CHRISTMAS COMES EARLIER EACH AIRY YEAR

Damned to sparagmos and pithishit, synthetic psychology with very little child´s tinsel left over ; that´s one way to pitch our human fate´s faith. The parataxis in some of the less bloody Psalms, of course, hints at golden glory Halleluia , the Plan B, we´ll have to call it.
My contrapuntal skill at surviving must marry a ” blow, bugles, blow” Chorus with a ” Is it that bodybags await us all ! ” Cantata .
Take as my title : “The birth of macrocounterpoint out of merry spirits at this our rapidly nearing Christmas Solstice”, that´s what Ishould be lecturing on, flying out soon from cold Hamburg to cold New York. Watch the tail-wind, whatever I do.
As geese fatten, turkeys will tremble. Each one, all. At all the Good News.
The house-mover cometh, ´tis no Holy Joke , rather more of a ” He flatteneth what he willeth , he filleth small joybooks and large kids´books into smelly cardboard boxes. Nor is he mocked by marching music. ” – I´ll chance an unwieldy title, ” The Unholy Alliance of Psalmic Parataxis.”
The house-movers hie nigh and our table heaped for the Feast .
This blog has in the past been known to equate altars with table-cloths and the knife that killed the golden goose or the Holy Solstice turkey. It now has the gall to question its blog´s festive joy, the aerodynamics of my December flight to North America. Westward ho and the wrapped child´s toy steam-rolle at Christmas .
Is there here the makings of another good Princeton lecture ? – The paratactics of the Psalms before December dark sneaks up on me totally ? ( Remember 2006´s blog , pre X-mas ? ) Music was born out of ritual killing and festive turkey-stuffing . How hymn it ?
If I am composed of time, I am temporal, my personal memory has been growing since first I graced my perambulator. I am who am. I am becoming. Will I be ? A has-been, also. Watch the tail-wind ( all that frosty flight-path back from New York ) above at eleven thousand metres. That golden goose on our Christmas table is, or it certainly was purely temporal .
No more she´ll cackle: ” who will google Mr. Google ? ” Our turkey died for thee and thee. After the house-move is over, after the ball is done, the time for tinsel ´s come. Suspend the sparagmos; desist insisting ” I am but pissishith ” . Or ” pithishith ” either !
There will be time before the tail-wind blows and the music stops hymning its lie . He filleth our festive cards and our carol texts and our turkey leavings into the cardboard house-movers´ boxes. How can parataxis face up to that, ye Psalms?

—————–
Weitergeleitete eMail:
Thema: Fwd: Christmas Hies 4
Datum: 16.11.2007 15:36:53 Westeuropäische Normalzeit
Von: FBCorcoran
An: FBCorcoran

In einer eMail vom 16.11.2007 14:07:24 Westeuropäische Normalzeit schreibt FBCorcoran:
CHRISTMAS COMES EARLIER EACH AIRY YEAR

Damned to sparagmos and pithishit, synthetic psychology with no child´s tinsel left over ; that´s one way to pitch human fate´s faith. The parataxis in some of these less bloody Psalms, of course, hint at golden glory Halleluia , the Plan B, we´ll have to call it.
My contrapuntal skill marries the ” blow, bugles, blow” Chorus with ” Is it , then, that bodybags await us all ! ”
And ” The birth of macrocounterpoint out of the merry spirits of this our rapidly nearing Christmas Solstice”, is that what I´ll lecture on, flying out very soon from cold Hamburg to cold New York ? Watch the tail-wind.
As geese fatten, turkeys tremble on this blessed night. Each one, all. At all the Good News.
The house-mover cometh, no Holy Joker but more of a ” He flatteneth what he will, he filleth small little joybooks into cardboard boxes. He is not mocked by marching music. ” – Is that what I should be lecturing on at Princeton , how music can at all contain Our Snowy Solstice Synthesis ? Or will I chance the unwieldy title, ” The Unholy Alliance of Psalmic Parataxis. Movers move house and the table heaped for the Feast .”
This blog has in the past been known to equate altars with table-cloths plus the knife that killed the golden goose or turkey or whatever . It has had the gall to question my festive joy or my aerodynamics in transatlantic flight, Westward ho, and the wrapped Christmas toy steam-roller. – Is there the makings of another good New York or Princeton lecture here ? – Paratactics before any December dark sneaks up on me ? Music was born out of the festive ritual killing , turkey-stuffing, you agree ? Does my very own macrocounterpoint lie in the very moment that it hymns ? And yet I am time, I am temporal, my personal memory growing and growing since first I ruled a perambulator. I am who am. I become. Will I be ? A has-been, too, my tail-wind ( all my frosty flight-path back from New York ) fading above at eleven thousand metres. My golden goose on the Christmas table is, or it certainly was pure time. A has been now , just like her table-companion, the turkey. No more she´ll cackle: ” But who will google Mr. Google ? ” She died. For thee and thee. Our fine turkey , also. After the house-move is over, after the ball is done. The time for tinsel ´s come. Suspend the sparagmos; desist insisting I am but pissishith. Or pithishith either ! There will be time. Before the tail-wind takes over and the music stops hymning, singing its lie or not. He fillith festive cards and carols and fine turkey leavings into cardboard house-movers´ boxes. How will parataxis face that, ye Psalms?

Yes, I do flutter and I do phight and I struggle and I rattle against these bars, this cage, that oaf, all these our tribulations and trials and our ( Pauline , of course – that unwashed , unwived mendicant preacher was a poet of world-class…. ) cross. The good fight, – perhaps it´s this PLUS AN GLÓIR which is the motor of culture, the real moth´s sizzle ? The mire and the quag and the glory behind or beyond ennui ( that foe which never sleepeth ? ? ) . Without me Deutschlandfunk would have no REAL content to broadcast to the edges of poor Steven Hawkings´ universe, apparently…. Content is very fine ; yet formless it lieth denuded there , unable to phly , phight or phlutter .

” They also serve who only stand and wait ” ( John Milton ) .

Did Milton ever hear of Bash ? Or of O ? No . Nor viceversa . Is this question trivial or quodrivial ? Both.

Why?

Frank Corcoran Interview Video for 2008 Dokumenta Kassel on:

http://www.documenta-dock.net/#p59

Well, it is. How natural a thing to hop on the waggon of a great composer one has however fleetingly known. Take ” Remembering Ligeti ” as this pan – European phenomenon rather than a genuine memorial to a giant of contemporary ( now , alas, no longer ! ) music. I remember the tea-filter he gave me as I came to Hamburg in 1983 , as he said Hamburg water was very poor tea-water. He was right. I remember the recording-copy he made himself for me of the then still freshly performed opera , ” Le Grand Macabre” , how he was still dissatisfied with certain places in the writing. Even after several revisions and cuts. Opened my ears ( – though I didn´t agree ).

I remember in ” The Sound Of Exile ” ( published in RTE´s THE QUIET CORNER , 2004 New Ireland Press, ed. Eoin Brady ).

I also remember – and am remembered, re-painted, interviewed – in Lutz Lesle´s ” Seelenlandschaft einer Insel ” ( Neue Zeitschrift für Musik 4 of July 2002 ).

I remember as well ” Frank Corcoran – Substanz für die Zukunft” with Hans Dieter Grünefeld
( Music Manual, Vienna, of Spring 2002 ) .

I try to remember myself , then, in ” It´s A Cold Wind Blows On An Irish Composer ” ( Kunst/Musik 4, Cologne, Spring 2005 )

Dokumenta 2008 in Kassel remembers to slap filmed bits of my thoughts on aesthetics and the
tea-filter on its 2008 filmed interview. I´ll dig out that web.

Magyar Rádió, Budapest, remembers to present my ” Ireland And Hungary” in English and Hungarian at its May 2006 Hommage à Bartók with the premiere of my then new ” Quasi Un Basso”.

I remember my J.M.I. essays , the seminal ” Do Dolmens Lament? ” ( Nov. 2001 ) , ” My Music Is A Four-Letter Word” ( March 2001 ) and especially ” Sligo New Music Festival 2000″ ( November 2000 ). – Has any Irish musicologist, music-theorist, music-pope, music-philosopher ever addressed my thesis ? – Remember ? The ” Irish Mikrokosmoi” were ” Scenes From My Receding Past”, remember ? They remember. Tones remember , too; also tonal masses , tonal wash, tone-colour, tonal lines and spaces and textures and cells and the geniality of a Ligeti idea or a Lutoslawsky rhythmic skein.

Dec. 29 N.D.R. 3 KULTUR . “Prisma – Musik ” . Frank Corcoran gives a two-hour Höranalyse
of Mozart´s G-Minor Symphony Nr. 40 .
The hearable unity between the themes and movements , the bearable behind the unbearable.

Will I talk about this at Princeton , December 14 coming up by stealth ? There IS a logical growth out of pre-born phonemes . Suffering, passive and active, does flow towards the Sacred Word, horror, fascinating and terrible, it is indeed the long shadow of human ex-istence and my words become Irish pipe-music. Treachery is ubiquitous in language, in memory, in blogging perception , whether the words and tones are self-referential or only half so. My Cello Solo-Suite I wrote in 1970. Did I ? It was influenced by Bach, Kodaly, Henze, that over-blown Reger. No art without the past. Níl séarach gan sanctóir. Suppose they hesitantly ask if even those who crucify can expect salvation ? How will Mozart compose not a programme but a correlative in sounds? Who´s the idiot now ? The future is obviously on the minds of a group like Ensemble Modern. Yet the future is unknowable. It´s when I look back that I see the Taj Mahal. ( Sorry about that ) . Every good art-work is a vision heard. In this short blog my theme is farewell. Sound is life. Sound takes leave of this world, of the women and nature of 7 th. c. Ireland. Machine- and human sound sing their last song. Ad multos annos is fine for some. Language does envy tone. Oh if the leaves of the old year were gold itself. As a young lad, my ears were clean.