"The encyclopaedia of music in Ireland ... represents the first comprehensive attempt to chart Irish musical experience across recorded history. It also documents Ireland's musical relations with the world at large, notably in Britain, continental Europe and the United States, and it seeks to identify those agencies (personal and organisational) through which music has expressed itself as a cardinal feature of Irish political, social, religious and cultural life"--Introduction, page xxi.
"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.
Harry White examines the influence of music in the development of the Irish literary imagination from 1800 to the present day. He identifies music as a preoccupation which originated in the poetry of Thomas Moore early in the nineteenth century. He argues that this preoccupation decisively influenced Moore's attempt to translate the 'meaning' of Irish music into verse, and that it also informed Moore's considerable impact on the development of European musical romanticism, as in the music of Berlioz and Schumann. White then examines how this preoccupation was later recovered by W.B. Yeats, whose poetry is imbued with music as a rival presence to language. In its readings of Yeats, Synge, Shaw and Joyce, the book argues that this striking musical awareness had a profound influence on the Irish literary imagination, to the extent that poetry, fiction and drama could function as correlatives of musical genres. Although Yeats insisted on the synonymous condition of speech and song in his poetry, Synge, Shaw and Joyce explicitly identified opera in particular as a generic prototype for their own work. Synge's formal musical training and early inclinations as a composer, Shaw's perception of himself as the natural successor to Wagner, and Joyce's no less striking absorption of a host of musical techniques in his fiction are advanced in this study as formative (rather than incidental) elements in the development of modern Irish writing. Music and the Irish Literary Imagination also considers Beckett's emancipation from the oppressive condition of words in general (and Joyce in particular) through the agency of music, and argues that the strong presence of Mendelssohn, Chopin and Janácek in the works of Brian Friel is correspondingly essential to Friel's dramatisation of Irish experience in the aftermath of Beckett. The book closes with a reading of Seamus Heaney, in which the poet's own preoccupation with the currency of established literary forms is enlisted to illuminate Heaney's abiding sense of poetry as music.
The Encyclopaedia of Ireland contains a full A-Z listing of over 5500 articles on all things Irish, past and present, written by experts in the various fields. All the text has been specially commissioned and written for the Encyclopaedia. From the Mesolithic Age to the 21st century, this reference covers subjects as diverse as: biography, education, art and architecture, topography, sport, literature, history and politics, military, commerce and law, folklore, natural history, science, religion, transport, engineering, diet, food and drink, music and many more.
The SAGE Encyclopedia of Music and Culture presents key concepts in the study of music in its cultural context and provides an introduction to the discipline of ethnomusicology, its methods, concerns, and its contributions to knowledge and understanding of the world's musical cultures, styles, and practices. The diverse voices of contributors to this encyclopedia confirm ethnomusicology's fundamental ethos of inclusion and respect for diversity. Combined, the multiplicity of topics and approaches are presented in an easy-to-search A-Z format and offer a fresh perspective on the field and the subject of music in culture. Key features include: Approximately 730 signed articles, authored by prominent scholars, are arranged A-to-Z and published in a choice of print or electronic editions Pedagogical elements include Further Readings and Cross References to conclude each article and a Reader’s Guide in the front matter organizing entries by broad topical or thematic areas Back matter includes an annotated Resource Guide to further research (journals, books, and associations), an appendix listing notable archives, libraries, and museums, and a detailed Index The Index, Reader’s Guide themes, and Cross References combine for thorough search-and-browse capabilities in the electronic edition
Medieval Ireland: An Encyclopedia brings together in one authoritative resource the multiple facets of life in Ireland before and after the Anglo-Norman invasion of 1169, from the sixth to sixteenth century. Multidisciplinary in coverage, this A–Z reference work provides information on historical events, economics, politics, the arts, religion, intellectual history, and many other aspects of the period. With over 345 essays ranging from 250 to 2,500 words, Medieval Ireland paints a lively and colorful portrait of the time. For a full list of entries, contributors, and more, visit the Routledge Encyclopedias of the Middle Ages website.
The history of Britain and Ireland is traditionally presented as a succession of dramatic changes, but in this reference work the 60 contributors under the editorship of Christopher Haigh have emphasized patterns of continuity instead, including cultural, social, political and economic themes. 300 illustrations.
In The Globalization of Irish Traditional Song Performance Susan Motherway examines the ways in which performers mediate the divide between local and global markets by negotiating this dichotomy in performance practice. In so doing, she discusses the globalizing processes that exert transformative influences upon traditional musics and examines the response to these influences by Irish traditional song performers. In developing this thesis the book provides an overview of the genre and its subgenres, illustrates patterns of musical change extant within the tradition as a result of globalization, and acknowledges music as a medium for re-negotiating an Irish cultural identity within the global. Given Ireland’s long history of emigration and colonisation, globalization is recognised as both a synchronic and a diachronic phenomenon. Motherway thus examines Anglo-Irish song and songs of the Irish Diaspora. Her analysis reaches beyond essentialist definitions of the tradition to examine evolving sub-genres such as Country & Irish, Celtic and World Music. She also recognizes the singing traditions of other ethnic groups on the island of Ireland including Orange-Order, Ulster-Scots and Traveller song. In so doing, she shows the disparity between native conceptions and native realities in respect to Irish cultural Identity.
Music and Identity in Ireland and Beyond represents the first interdisciplinary volume of chapters on an intricate cultural field that can be experienced and interpreted in manifold ways, whether in Ireland (The Republic of Ireland and/or Northern Ireland), among its diaspora(s), or further afield. While each contributor addresses particular themes viewed from discrete perspectives, collectively the book contemplates whether ’music in Ireland’ can be regarded as one interrelated plane of cultural and/or national identity, given the various conceptions and contexts of both Ireland (geographical, political, diasporic, mythical) and Music (including a proliferation of practices and genres) that give rise to multiple sites of identification. Arranged in the relatively distinct yet interweaving parts of ’Historical Perspectives’, ’Recent and Contemporary Production’ and ’Cultural Explorations’, its various chapters act to juxtapose the socio-historical distinctions between the major style categories most typically associated with music in Ireland - traditional, classical and popular - and to explore a range of dialectical relationships between these musical styles in matters pertaining to national and cultural identity. The book includes a number of chapters that examine various movements (and ’moments’) of traditional music revival from the late eighteenth century to the present day, as well as chapters that tease out various issues of national identity pertaining to individual composers/performers (art music, popular music) and their audiences. Many chapters in the volume consider mediating influences (infrastructural, technological, political) and/or social categories (class, gender, religion, ethnicity, race, age) in the interpretation of music production and consumption. Performers and composers discussed include U2, Raymond Deane, Afro-Celt Sound System, E.J. Moeran, Séamus Ennis, Kevin O’Connell, Stiff Little Fingers, Frederick May, Arnold
This volume explores not only the close ties that link the cultures and musics of East and Northeast Asia, but also the distinctive features that separate them.
