[live] The Zurmukhti Music Ensemble play in a church

This lot were playing live as part of the Five Lamps Festival. In case you are unfamiliar with Dublin, the Five Lamps is a north inner city landmark (a lamppost at a junction with five lamps) that to an extent gives its name to the surrounding area. The area is a bit heart of the rowl. The Zurmukhti Music Ensemble were playing in the St. Laurence O'Toole Church on Seville Terrace. The ensemble's name is an odd one but it has a meaning. The group sings Georgian polyphonic music and Zurmukhti translates into English as Emerald (for Emerald Isle). And this is the singing group that Irene has been singing with and this was to be possibly their first proper public concert.

The songs brought us on a musical tour of Georgia and were performed sometimes by the full choir and sometimes in smaller groups, with most of the songs probably being performed in trios. All of the songs featured the sustained notes and three part harmonies I think of as Georgian music's thing. I understand that if you know about these things (i.e. if you are a member of the Zurmukhti choir) then you can see clear stylistic differences between the regional repertoires, but for someone like me their overall Georgianness was more salient than anything else.

They finished with a song that had the whole choir blasting forth at us and I was impressed at how they had programmed the show to end with such a bang. Afterwards Irene revealed that most of them had never heard the song before and were just copying the handful who did. I don't think anyone in the audience noticed.

Afterwards I was lounging around with some of our friends who had come along to the concert, and one of them remarked of one of the Zurmukhti members that she was smiling a lot and looked very happy about things. I revealed that she was none other than one of the presenters of the evening of erotic songs and stories of the night before.

Zurmukhti Georgian Ensemble

That evening of erotic songs and stories (do not click on that link unless you are broadminded and adult enough to handle a frank account of an evening of erotic songs and stories)

An inuit panda production