Caitríona O'Leary Celebrates 'Old Twelvey' With Wassailing and Other Songs

On Saturday January 16th, Heresy Records’ recording artist Caitríona O’Leary will perform the 33rd installment of Unaccompanied, her weekly series of micro-concerts live-streamed on Facebook every Saturday at 2:30 PM Dublin time (GMT).  For Unaccompanied O’Leary performs a wide range of songs written - or intended - to be performed without accompaniment. The repertoire for Unaccompanied includes medieval songs, sean nós, folk and traditional songs from Ireland, England, Scotland and North America among other rarely-heard works. During the broadcast O’Leary speaks about the history, provenance and texts of the songs. She often performs variants of the same song which may be found in different countries and on different continents.

She performs in costumes which she designs and makes for each performance. Videos of the concert are available for replay on her YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-O5nz3FMldmVrdGP1eAAhw)

For Unaccompanied 33 O’Leary will be celebrating “Old Twelvey”, Twelfth Night as it was known (in England and its colonies) until the Calendar Act of 1750 when the English belatedly adopted the Gregorian Calendar which came into effect in 1752. Wassail is derived from Anglo-Saxon meaning “be you healthy”. Wassailing was a pagan tradition celebrating the death of winter and blessing the apple trees and calling on the fertility gods to produce fruit. Caitríona will sing a couple of songs in this tradition: Gower Wassail (traditional Welsh) and Apple Wassail (traditional English)and the traditional Irish Boatman Ale Song.

Caitríona O’Leary is internationally renowned as a singer of early music, traditional Irish song and folk music. She is particularly known for her performances and recordings of unaccompanied song. In reference to a concert which she performed at Beethovenfest Bonn, the General Anzeiger wrote, “This is a special genre of vocal art, called sean nós…in this type of singing O’Leary is a master.” Her latest recording for Heresy Records, The Red Book of Ossory with her ensemble, Anakronos received five stars from the Irish Times, ArtMuseLondon called it “a singular work of genius” and RTÉ Lyric fm and The Journal of Music lauded it as “One of the records of the year”. Most recently she is featured in the short film, Love’s Fever based on the song Deh Lassa La Mia Vita from Day 7 of Boccaccio’s Decameron - Watch it here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMVw2rwx48I&feature=youtu.be)

The idea for Unaccompanied was inspired by a May 2^nd concert O’Leary performed as part of Ireland Performs, an online series of concerts established in response to the Covid-19 pandemic presented by Culture Ireland and Facebook Ireland. 

Unaccompanied 33: Programme – Saturday January 16th, 2021

Gower Wassail, traditional Welsh
Apple Wassail, traditional English
Boatman Ale Song, traditional Irish

UNACCOMPANIED: FEATURING CAITRÍONA O’LEARY

EVERY SATURDAY BEGINNING 2:30 PM (GMT 1)

FACEBOOK LINK TO CONCERT-  https://www.facebook.com/caitriona.oleary.3/

YOUTUBE CHANNEL - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-O5nz3FMldmVrdGP1eAAhw?view_as=subscriber

 ABOUT CAITRÍONA O’LEARY

Caitríona O’Leary (www.caitrionaoleary.com) has recorded twenty-five critically acclaimed albums with her band Dúlra and the celebrated early music ensembles Sequentia, The Harp Consort, Joglaresa, eX among others. Her recording of The Wexford Carols (producer Joe Henry, guest artists Tom Jones, Rosanne Cash, Rhiannon Giddens, Dónal Lunny) reached #1 on Billboard.

Caitríona has worked closely with many of early music's leading artists including Christopher Hogwood, Ben Bagby, Andrew Lawrence King, Konrad Junghaenel, Pedro Memelsdorff, Hille Perl, Lee Santana and many others. 

Caitríona has toured and performed around the world, including such venues as the Royal Albert Hall, Lincoln Center, Radio City Music Hall, Cité de la Musique and the National Concert Hall, Dublin to name a few. She regularly performs at festivals throughout Europe and beyond including Halle Handel Festival, Beethovenfest Bonn, Tage Alter Musik Herne, Utrecht Early Music Festival, Tage Alter Musik Regensburg, Festival Montalbâne, Festival Cervantino Guanajuato (Mexico), Festival Interceltique de Lorient, Concerts Spirituels Geneva, Zagreb Summer Evenings Festival, Split Summer Festival (Croatia), Dublin Theatre Festival, Kilkenny Arts Festival, Belfast Festival at Queen’s, etc.