New Dublin Voices - Snow Dance for the Dead [CD]

Cat. no: VCM170
Format: CD
Barcode: 5060140212614
Release Date: 21 Feb 2025
Genre: Classical

Celebrating their twentieth anniversary, the internationally renowned Irish chamber choir New Dublin Voices and their conductor Bernie Sherlock present 'Snow Dance for the Dead - Choral Music by Sean Doherty'.Sean Doherty is one of the most exciting Irish composers active today

New Dublin Voices has given the world premieres of six of his pieces and the Irish premieres of four more. 

Bernie Sherlock says, "an obvious aspect of the power of Sean's music is how the texts he chooses refect his strong social conscience, his political insight and historical awareness, and his readiness to engage with difcult subject matter.

He is often drawn to Irish poets, both living and dead, including W.B. Yeats, Paula Meehan, Brendan Kennelly, Eva Gore- Booth, and Katharine Tynan. He also has a special afnity with the obscure and intriguing Lola Ridge whose verses feature in no fewer than four of the pieces recorded here. 

"Something else that's so striking about Sean's music is its incredible range. While 'Snow Dance' leaves you devastated, a piece like 'Under-Song' transports you into the heart of nature and "It's Strange About Stars" places you beneath the sky at night. You can hear him poaching effects from pop music, for example in "Time" where he brilliantly recreates the way we perceive time at more than one speed. Sometimes the beauty he creates is simply heart-breaking, as in his arrangement of "Little Girl Blue"." 

'Snow Dance for the Dead - Choral Music by Sean Doherty' is New Dublin Voices' third consecutive album of music by Irish composers. The Times awarded fve stars to the choir's 2017 disc of Christmas music from Ireland, Make We Merry, which it said "bubbles with energy and wit".

VOCES8 Records releases 'Snow Dance for the Dead' in February 2025 with a launch concert by New Dublin Voices at MoLI, The Museum of Literature, on St. Stephens Green in Dublin.

Tracks: Time / I Am the World / Epiphany / An Irish Airman Foresees His Death / A Crazed Girl / The Ghost Song / The Graves at Arbour Hill / Hail! Gladdening Light / In te, Christe / Stella celi extirpavit / Bean Phaidin / Little Girl Blue / Good King Wenceslas / The Destroyer / It's Strange About Stars / Under-Song / Snow Dance for the Dead