DONEGAL COUNTY COUNCIL CULTURAL SERVICES PRESENT
Oíche Airneáil – Gort an Choirce
- Thursday 25th July
- 8pm
- Music
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DONEGAL COUNTY COUNCIL CULTURAL SERVICES PRESENT
Oíche Airneáil with Úna Monaghan, Gráinne Holland, Cathal Ó Searcaigh
Fear an Tí, Cathal Ó Searcaigh hosts an evening of spoken word and music at Dámhlann an Ghleanna featuring artists Úna Monaghan and Gráinne Holland.
Úna Monaghan is a harper, composer, researcher and sound artist from Belfast. She performs with harp and electronics. Úna collaborates, improvises and performs widely with poets, writers, visual artists and fellow musicians. She also works as a sound engineer, specializing in Irish traditional and experimental live electronic music, a role in which she travels the world.
Her most recent recording, Aonarachat, featuring new compositions by Úna performed by, among others, Paddy Glackin, Pauline Scanlan and Saileog Ní Cheannabháin, was released in 2023. A feature documentary of the same title, exploring Úna’s work, was broadcast on BBC 2 NI earlier this year.
Gráinne Holland is a singer songwriter, storyteller and radio and television producer. Brought up in a bilingual environment, she attended the first Irish medium school in Northern Ireland, Bunscoil Phobal Feirste. Gráinne released her debut album of traditional songs with contemporary arrangements, Teanga na nGael, to critical acclaim in 2011. Corcra, a collection of her own compositions, followed in 2019.
In recent years, Gráinne has begun to write and compose specifically for children. In 2021 she released a book and CD of her own compositions, Ceol na Sióg, while her most recent work for children, Draíocht an Dúlra, was issued earlier this year.
Gráinne has also developed and written a podcast series, Scéalta Tuatha Dé Danann, a retelling of mythological Irish stories, woven seamlessly with music and song.
Cathal Ó Searcaigh is a poet and novelist from Mín an Leá, Gort an Choirce. A longtime member of Aosdána, Cathal’s early collections – Súile Shuibhne (1983) and Suibhne ( 1987) – heralded the arrival of one of the most exciting new literary voices of his generation. His most recent collection, An Tír Rún, was issued by Arlen House in 2022.
Last year saw the publication by Irish Pages of a major anthology of Cathal’s writings on the theme of Errigal – Errigal, A Sacred Mountain. The publication was accompanied by the commissioning of a new suite of music by Neil Martin, Sliabh an Solais, also in celebration of Donegal’s iconic mountain.
Cathal’s novel, Saighdiúir, the first such in the Irish language on the subject of the First World War, was published recently by Leabhar Breac.
- Date: Thursday 25th July
- Time: 8pm
- Location: Mín an Leá,, Gortahork
- Venue: Dámhlann an Ghleanna
- Admission/Cost: €15
