Ancient Music Ireland
Simon O’Dwyer & Maria Cullen O’Dwyer

Many musical instruments have their origins in animal material.  Early flutes are made from bird bones.  Ancient Irish bronze trumpets are derived from domestic animal horns e.g. cattle, sheep and goats.  Skin and bones are used for percussion.  Simple flute stones which occur naturally on the sea shore are made by shellfish that drill holes into them.  Seashells have been sounded as musical horns for thousands of years.  Ancient Music Ireland’s presentation will especially feature the evolution of the great horn and trumpet tradition of Ireland and Britain from ancient cattle horns to ritualised Bronze Age instruments and culminating in the great trumpas of the Iron Age.