Imagining Ireland: Ireland - A Dataset by Jennifer Walshe

NATIONAL CONCERT HALL PRESENTS IMAGINING IRELAND

‘IRELAND: A DATASET’ BY JENNIFER WALSHE SATURDAY 26 SEPTEMBER 2020 Ireland: A Dataset is a new commission as part of the NCH & Sounding The Feminists (STF) Commissioning Scheme supported

by Creative Ireland.

IRELAND: A DATASET BY JENNIFER WALSHE

Ireland: A Dataset is a boisterous radiophonic play made for the National Concert Hall Ireland.

What is Ireland? Is it a country? An idea? The location of Planet AhchTo and Game of Thrones? What does it mean to be considered “Irish”?

At a time when the land of saints and scholars is now also the home of the largest and most powerful tech companies in the world, composer, vocalist and artist Jennifer Walshe uses AI to look at a country in which everything from landscape to identity has been idealised, appropriated and remixed.

In Walshe’s dataset, neural networks dream in psychedelic John Hinde greens; AI listens to Enya, Riverdance and The Pogues, and starts to fashion its own version of seannós.

For this one-off performance, Jennifer Walshe collaborates with saxophonist Nick Roth, vocal Ensemble Tonnta Singers (Robbie Blake, Elizabeth Hilliard, Bláthnaid Conroy Murphy, Simon MacHale), sound engineer Una Monaghan and lighting design Aedin Cosgrove.

This concert will be available to tickets holders for 24 hours following the performance.

NCH PRESENTS IMAGINING IRELAND

ABOUT JENNIFER WALSHE

“The most original compositional voice to emerge from Ireland in the past 20 years” (The Irish Times) and “wild girl of Darmstadt” (Frankfurter Rundschau), composer and performer Jennifer Walshe was born in Dublin in 1974. Her music has been commissioned, broadcast and performed all over the world. She has been the recipient of fellowships and prizes from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, New York, the DAAD Berliner Künstlerprogramm, the Internationales Musikinstitut, Darmstadt and Akademie Schloss Solitude among others. Walshe has written a large number of operas and theatrical works, including XXX_LIVE_NUDE_GIRLS!!! an opera for Barbie dolls, and TIME TIME TIME, with the philosopher Timothy Morton, which the Wire described as “a sprawling opus that spans the history of the planet… like Robert Ashley meets Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life”. Her visual work has been exhibited in the Chelsea Art Museum, New York, Project Arts Centre, Dublin and the ICA, London. (www.milker.org www.aisteach.org).

LIVESTREAMS FROM THE NCH 27/09 narolane records presents

DENISE CHAILA, GOD KNOWS AND MURLI 30/09

CAOIMHÍN Ó RAGHALLAIGH CORMAC BEGLEY SOLO | DUO 03/10

RHIANNON GIDDENS WITH FRANCESCO TURRISI: there is no other All performances start at 8pm Ireland, UK, Europe BST / 9.00pm CEST. Tickets from €7. Tickets for the stream are available exclusively via DICE.fm

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