Irish Philharmonic Singers

The Irish Philharmonic Singers is a chamber choir comprised of 24 professional musicians and lifelong choristers from across the island of Ireland. The newly formed ensemble whose purpose it is to bring to life the greatest of contemporary choral music has one essential principle: the love of harmony, or ‘phil-harmonia’. This exciting and ambitious chamber choir will bring the finest of modern neo-romantic and post avant-garde choral music to Irish audiences; complex and deeply emotional music which captivates the listener. The Irish Philharmonic Singers is conducted by founder Daniel Beuster, an Irish musician based in Cork and a graduate of the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre. Daniel Beuster studied choral and orchestral conducting under Estonia’s Tonu Kaljuste and Sylvia Landra, who draw on the deep and rich choral traditions nurtured in the Leningrad and Moscow conservatories and bearing rich fruit in the Baltic Academies of Music.

The début concert tour of the Irish Philharmonic Singers brings an exciting programme of contemporary choral music to audiences in Cork, Galway and Limerick in early September. The term chiaroscuro from which the programme derives its titledescribes a technique exemplified by 16^th and 17^th century artists da Vinci, Caravaggio and Rembrandt; together with its darker cousin tenebrism, it is typified by the violent contrast of light and dark. In the context of this concert programme, chiaroscuro expresses the compositional techniques employed by a collection of contemporary Estonian, Finnish and American composers with the late 20^th century addition of Volga German composer Alfred Schnittke. Each piece on the programme explores a unique contrast of light and dark: the chiaro (or light) melodies seizing the listener, set against the oscuro (or dark) canvas of intricately woven harmony. The fundamental theme of the programme is a maratime theme including a modern setting of the Marian hymn Ave Maris Stella, and culminating in the highly dramatic musical depiction of the 1994 disaster of the MS Estonia which sank in the Baltic Sea.

The Chiaroscuro programme (ca. 60 minutes’ duration) with no less than four Irish premières will be performed on Thursday the 4^th of September 20:00 in St Patrick’s Church, Cork city, with free admission and a retiring collection; Saturday the 6^th of September 20:00 in St Nicholas’ Collegiate Church, Galway city where tickets can be purchased on the door; and Sunday the 7^th of September at 18:00 in St Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick city with free admission and a retiring collection.

Upcoming Concerts