On the 5th and 6th of May the renowned Cross Border Orchestra of Ireland will perform "Atlantic Rhythms" at The Royal Theatre, Castlebar, Co Mayo to mark the end of the orchestra’s 10th anniversary celebrations. The concerts at the Royal Theatre will feature the Mayo Combined Primary Schools Choirs which involves 30 Primary schools from every corner of the county, and a total of 600 primary school children.
On the 1st of November 2005 the Cross Border Orchestra of Ireland performed "Atlantic Rhythms" to sell out crowds at Carnegie Hall, New York - the world’s most venerated music venue. The Carnegie concert was hailed as "the greatest Irish American celebration in New York in living memory". Irish Voice, New York
In the past 10 years, the Orchestra has performed at almost every major venue in Ireland to packed houses and critical acclaim. They have toured extensively throughout Europe and America, and featured on national and international radio and television. The Orchestra aims to further national and international understanding and to give all of our young people once in a lifetime opportunities. The concerts at the Royal Theatre will be a great celebration of the successes which the CBOI has enjoyed over the past 10 years.
"Atlantic Rhythms" will be a spectacular celebration of youth and music, and simply shouldn’t be missed.Under the sure hand of renowned conductor Gearoid Grant, the Ireland’s Premiere Pops Orchestra will perform a brilliant and varied programme of music including "Satchmo – Tribute to Louis Armstrong", " A Salute to Old Blue Eyes", Céad Míle Fáilte" themes form "Grease" and Hardiman’s "Lord of the Dance".
Ireland’s best-loved tenor Emmanuel Lawler will join with the orchestra to perform popular showstoppers such as "You Raise Me Up" and "Bring Him Home". The brilliant Uilleann Piper Peter Browne who is legendary in traditional Irish music circles will perform excerpts from Sean Davy’s turbulent and evocative "Brendan Voyage".
To add to this spectacular occasion, the Mayo Combined Primary School Choirs will join the Cross Border Orchestra for up-tempo performances of well-known choruses including "The Rhythm of Life", the "Bare Necessities", and "We Go Together".
The finale of the concert will see the 120 strong Symphony Youth Orchestra joined by 300 voices of the Mayo Combined Primary School Choirs to perform Wilhousky’s powerful and uplifting "Battle Hymn of the Republic".
Be prepared for a tremendous night of music, extraordinary sound and contagious excitement.
MESSAGE FROM ENDA KENNY
LEADER OF FINE GAEL
It’s going to be a wonderful night tonight. In Mayo, we’ll get a chance to see for ourselves, just how these remarkable young people of the CBOI had the sell-out audiences at Carnegie Hall and the Boston Symphony Hall not just in their palm, but on their feet!
If our children are a living message to a time we will not see, then these extraordinary young people, suggest for us, that future is one of infinite possibility and potential. This concert by the CBOI, joined tonight by our own children from all over Mayo, is one of a series of precious moments, uniting young people and their families, North and South, East and West, of every religion and none, in the sheer joy, the absolute beauty of music. Above all else, music has the power to heal and transform. Its physical vibration alone, clears old residue, rescues us from trauma, calms the mind, restores our soul. If you’ve ever experienced that profound ‘awareness’, achieved through a Bach prelude or a scrap of a song that your mother, and her mother and grandmother sang before them, then you know exactly what I mean.
It’s the same, then, when it comes to this island. Through the CBOI, young people are working across borders to create a new story, a new possibility, and above all, a new awareness for us all. And that new, healing alliance is working beyond the island. Even in America, CBOI is performing with young men and women whose own ‘people’ would have arrived, dazed on Famine ships from all over Ireland. And tonight, doesn’t it feel exactly right that they should be here in Mayo, where for so many generations, we lost so many of our best and brightest to hunger and emigration? So, as you listen, tonight, remember all of those who, through the centuries, swapped the songs of Belmullet and Ballinrobe strange and unknown Atlantic Rhythms.
The CBOI was formed just after the first Ceasefire. There are parallels between this acclaimed ensemble and the West-Ostlicher Divan Orchestra, set up by the internationally-renowned Daniel Barenboim and the late, great Edward Said to create a similar, new awareness in young Arabs and Israelis.
For Barenboim, ‘belonging’ to multiple cultures was not just "a possibility", it was "something to aspire to", because "a sense of belonging to different cultures can only be enriching". The same could be said of the CBOI.
I regret that with the Fine Gael Ard Fheis taking place in Dublin, I can’t be with the orchestra in the Royal Theatre tonight. But even there, we will be working to make sure that what I call ‘The Two Irelands’ do come together. In other words, that at last, the people of Ireland will get to see the hard work and great success of their private lives, reflected in our public services.
Welcome CBOI! Congratulations to you and all the young people from across Mayo. Your performance will prove what we suspect in our quieter moments – that in the end, there is just one continuum of being - and make this, truly, a lá d’ár saol.
Enda Kenny
Leader of Fine Gael
Tickets for Atlantic Rhythms are available from the Royal Theatre Phone 094 9023111 Or 0818300000 Or www.royaltheatre.ie
