Ardee Baroque Festival is on this weekend from Friday 22 to Sunday 24 November and will see a programme of early music concerts mixing classical and traditional plus talks in Ardee, Co. Louth. The annual two-day festival will this year feature Sharon Carty, Musici Ireland and trumpeters Crispian Steele-Perkins and Niall O’Sullivan, and Camerata Kilkenny with uilleann piper David Power.

Arias and trumpets
The opening event on Friday features mezzo-soprano Sharon Carty’s ‘Suitcase Arias’, named after the practice of singers in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries of adding arias into operas they were singing in. A Journal of Music review of Carty in May said ‘the evening provided the audience with more than just beautiful arias but also an … immersive early music experience’. Among the works Carty will sing are Gluck’s ‘Addio, addio’ and ‘Che Farò Senza Euridice?’ from Orfeo ed Euridice. 

Chamber music group Musici Ireland will be in concert on Saturday 23 November in Ardee’s St Mary’s Church for a performance of works by Handel, Vivaldi and Bach. The ensemble will be joined by trumpeters Crispian Steele-Perkins and Niall O’Sullivan for Vivaldi’s virtuosic concerto for two trumpets. 

Baroque and traditional Irish music
On 24 November, early music ensemble Camerata Kilkenny will perform with uilleann piper David Power in a concert titled ‘The Piper and the Fairy Queen’, an exploration of the connections between Irish traditional and baroque music. In a review of an accompanying recording that the group released last year, Adrian Scahill wrote ‘Power’s solo work is exceptional.’ The event will feature works by Carolan, Telemann, Purcell and Leclair, and a selection of traditional tunes.

Guest talk and literature reading
In Ardee Library on Saturday, the festival will feature an event with literary group Lit Lab, a collective of poetry and prose writers from Meath and Cavan who will read excerpts from their latest anthology Where You May Find Yourself. On Sunday, Dr James O’Brien Moran – piper and lecturer at Waterford Institute of Technology – will give a talk on the connections between baroque music and the bagpipe. 

Commenting on the programme to the Journal of Music, director Pauline Ashwood said:

Over the years, Ardee Baroque has been host to many wonderful performers and performances … Musicians descend on the County Louth town for three days of glorious early music. It’s a joy to programme events of this nature in a town that is steeped in history. Audience reactions are always so positive with many often surprised by how familiar some of the music is.

For more, visit ardeebaroque.com.