2008 Living Music Festival: Introduction

This seems like ages ago... I seem to be generating material faster than I can post it here. Oh well. Anyway, Arvo Pärt is this Estonian composer guy. He is quite old now, and has been writing his music for a long time, producing work that fits into the 20th century musical mould of dissonance and atonality as well as making tunes your mother would like. His religious faith seems to have increasingly informed his work as his career progressed, with much of what he does being choral work of a devotional nature.

This year Pärt was the featured composer in the RTÉ Living Music Festival. Unlike last year's composer (John Adams), Pärt actually showed up, which was nice. My beloved and I went to a good few of the concerts, though we missed a few because lethargy made it impossible for us to go for tickets before they were sold out. Sigh. I was particularly upset to miss the Crash Ensemble performances, as their stuff has typically been a highlight of previous Living Music Festivals.

I will talk about each concert we attended in turn.

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