Séamas de Barra is a composer and Senior Lecturer at the Cork School of Music.
Séamas de Barra
Debates about the ‘Irishness’ of a composer’s music are not new in Ireland. The subject often occuppied Aloys Fleischmann, particularly as a young man in the 1930s. Séamas de Barra traces the development of his ideas and his early compositional style...
‘We all felt very lonely after you had gone. Your visit was like a part of an Irish fairy tale...’. Part and parcel of the British Composer Arnold Bax’s attachment to Ireland was his warm friendship with the Fleischmanns in Cork. Drawing on original letters between the composer and this musical family, Séamas de Barra tells the story.
'And in a moment the Celt within me stood revealed,' wrote the English composer Arnold Bax on reading Yeats in 1902. But what really was Arnold Bax's relationship with Ireland? Is it true that Ireland was incapable of responding to his music? Just over fifty years since this intruiging figure died in Cork, Irish composer Séamas de Barra looks at his life and music, and his infatuation with Ireland...
Dear Editor, Richard Pine has let himself down badly in his response in the last issue of the JMI to Patrick Zuk’s article ‘Music and Nationalism’. Pine has previously made a couple of ineffective and bad-tempered swipes at Zuk which, neatly...
Dear Editor,In his letter to the last issue of the JMI, Axel Klein does not address a single point in Patrick Zuk’s review of Musical Constructions of Nationalism. But the message comes across clearly that an international reputation must be understood...
The Irish Youth Choir has recently launched This Is My Will, a CD of sacred choral music by Angel Climent, the Spanish-born composer who has lived and worked in Cork for the past forty years. Séamas de Barra outlines his career and tells the story of how he came to Cork.