Caitriona O'Leary Performs Online Concert of Early Music and Traditional Winter & Christmas Songs

On Saturday December12th, Heresy Records’ recording artist, Caitríona O’Leary, will perform the 29th installment of Unaccompanied her weekly series of micro-concerts live-streamed on Facebook every Saturday at 2:30 PM Dublin time (GMT 1:00).  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 nòs, 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. For Unaccompanied 29 O’Leary will perform three early music and traditional songs based on the themes of winter and Christmas. They are: Drive the Cold Winter Away, a 17th century, English traditional song, Sovrana sì ne' sembianti, a song from 14th century Florence and

On Christmas Night All Christians Sing, one of the Wexford Carols which features lyrics by Luke Wadding (1628-1691) which is set to a traditional melody. The Wexford Carols are considered Ireland’s greatest Christmas music and were written during and soon after Cromwell’s conquest of Ireland and the sack of Wexford. In 2014 O’Leary recorded the first complete version of these carols on an album which included Tom Jones, Rhiannon Giddens and Rosanne Cash.

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 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”.

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 28: Programme – Saturday December 12th, 2020

Drive the Cold Winter Away - 17th century, English

Sovrana sì ne' sembianti - 14th century, Florentine

On Christmas Night All Christians Sing - words by Luke Wadding (1628-1691), tune traditional - one of the Wexford Carols

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.