Steve Cooney and Cormac Breatnach in Concert

‘Master
Cooney restores the ancient link between lyre and lyric, between poetry and
performance, the rhapsody and rascality.’   Seamus Heaney

This is a rare opportunity to
see Cormac Breatnach and Steve Cooney perform together despite having
collaborated with each other in many musical events over three decades.

Australian-born guitarist Steve
Cooney, a long time Irish resident, won three awards in the 2020 RTÉ
Folk Music Awards: The Lifetime Achievement Award, as well as the Best
Traditional Folk Track prize for his version of Eleanor Plunkett, and Best Folk
Album for “Ceol Ársa Cláirsí: Tunes of the Irish Harpers for
Solo Guitar”, his solo album debut after four decades collaborating with
the finest traditional musicians in the field. He is also recording  fusion music with
his band ”Éiníní”. ‘His influence on Irish trad guitar is akin to
Hendrix’s on rock: he raised the bar and the rest of the world is
still catching up. Since Cooney, and in his image, guitar accompanists have
driven Irish music with momentum and visceral energy, though none has yet
matched Cooney’s genius.’ - Mike Scott, The Waterboys.

https://stevecooneymusic.com/baile

Cormac Breatnach’s whistle playing can
be heard on over 30 albums. In recent times, he received Arts Council Funding
for two unrelated Projects: “The Whistle Blower Project” (with Daire Bracken
and Martin Tourish dealing with a family trauma) and “Loco Por Lorca”
(with Irish poets Theo Dorgan and Keith Payne and musicians Cormac de Barra and
from Spain, Jaime Munoz and Carlos Beceiro) which celebrated Spain’s National
Poet, Federico G. Lorca. Cormac also plays with the Wicklow-based baroque-music
group, Sonamus.

www.cormacbreatnach.com and
www.thewhistleblower.ie 

We are delighted to welcome
Cormac and Steve for an unforgettable night of music.