Mosaics and Sketches: Brian Boydell’s Music for Harp

The harp is well represented in the composition catalogue of Irish composer Brian Boydell (1917-2000) and features significantly in the composer’s concert programmes, most notably in the musical celebrations for his seventieth and eightieth birthdays presented at the National Concert Hall, Dublin. He collaborated with many of Ireland’s leading harpists to produce solo works for Irish harp and pedal harp, voice and Irish harp, chamber ensembles and orchestra. This presentation focuses on works written and revised in the period of 1960-1980, including Quintet for Flute, Harp and String Trio, Op. 49 (1960, revised 1966 and 1980), Four Sketches for Two Irish Harps, Op. 52 (1961 - 1962), A Pack of Fancies for a Travelling Harper, Op. 66 (1970) and Five Mosaics for Violin and Harp, Op. 69 (1972). With a particular focus on performance considerations, the presentation will consider the context of the works in terms of Boydell’s compositional output, drawing on a variety of sources, including manuscript scores, correspondence, interviews, concert programmes and reviews.

[The paper included live performance of extracts from Boydell’s solo work for harp, ‘A Pack of Fancies for a Travelling Harper’.]