Launch of fermata: Writers inspired by Music
edited by Eva Bourke and Vincent Woods
and published by
Artisan House Connemara
Described by Niall MacMonagle, editor of Windharp as ‘A pitch perfect book’.
The anthology fermata: Writers inspired by Music edited by Eva Bourke and Vincent Woods will be launched on Saturday next, 3rd December, in Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop in Galway. The event will include readings from some of the sixty-five writers and poets who contributed to the anthology including Mary O’Malley, Pete Mullineaux and Gerry Hanberry as well as live music.
A fermata in musical notation is a pause or a hold extending the length of the note played, literally a breathing space. This collection of poems and prose writings closely engages with music, from classical to traditional, jazz and blues to rock music. It is a chorus of diverse and lively voices in response to the most beloved of all the arts.
This collection was formed by the editors, Vincent Woods and Eva Bourke, from a passionate belief in the Irish tradition of music and word, a connection embodied in this magnificent and entertaining compilation of writings on music in poetry or prose. Michéal Ó Súílleabháin, former director of the Limerick School of Music, has provided a wonderful foreword and Christy McNamara’s beautifully evocative photographs are sensitively employed in the book. The book is available in softback or, for a special gift, a hardback edition, limited to 150 copies, signed by the editors and ten of the contributors is available at the very reasonable cost of €50.
Artisan House, based in Letterfrack, Connemara, are the publishers and the production of fermata was made possible only by the generous contribution of music and poetry-lovers who supported a Fund-it campaign earlier in the year.
Amongst the poets/writers included are: Ken Bruen, Moya Cannon, Ciaran Carson, Harry Clifton, Theo Dorgan, Paul Durcan, Peter Fallon, Leonita Flynn, Hugo Hamilton, Eamon Grennan, James Harpur, Seamus Heaney, Rita Ann Higgins, Pearse Hutchinson, Thomas Kinsella, Michael Longley, Joan McBreen, Paula Meehan, John Montague, Sinéad Morrissey, Dennis O’Driscoll, Brian Leyden, Justin Quinn, Gabriel Rosenstock, Colm Tóibin, and David Wheatley.
The writing is inspired by singers, composers, musicians, dancers and the music of ‘what happens’. From Bach, Shostakovich, Saint Saëns, Fauré and other favourite composers, to a lullaby in a dead South African language, from a practice session in a community centre to the melodious litany for a wagtail, from elegies for Elvis and a lament for Johnny Cash, from an old LP found in the barn, the bass roar of the ocean and airborne tunes with a ghostly provenance to young Irish immigrants in 1920s New York visiting the Metropolitan Opera, all this and far more can be found in fermata.
For further information contact:
Mary Ruddy, Editorial Director, Artisan House, Letterfrack, Co. Galway.
Email: [email protected]
Tel: 087 333 4627
fermata: Writing inspired by Music
Editors: Eva Bourke & Vincent Woods
RRP: €25 / £19.95
Special limited edition: €50 (available from publishers only)
Publishers: Artisan House Connemara
Publication date: 24th September, 2016.
Available from www.artisanhouse.ie, and bookshops
Eva Bourke
Eva Bourke is a German-born poet, translator and teacher who has lived in Galway for most of her adult life. She now divides her time between Berlin and Galway. She has published six collections of poetry, two comprehensive anthologies of contemporary Irish poets in German translation, as well as a collection by the German poet Elisabeth Borchers (Poetry Europe Series, Dedalus Press). Together with Bórbala Fárago she edited an anthology of immigrant poets to Ireland, entitled Landing Places (2010, Dedalus Press). She is a member of Aosdána.
Vincent Woods
Vincent Woods is a Leitrim-born poet, playwright, song-writer and broadcaster (Arts Tonight, RTE1) who has published poetry collections including The Colour of Language. His playwriting credits include A Cry from Heaven, At the Black Pig’s Dyke, John Hughdy and Tom John, and Song of the Yellow Bittern. He is a member of Aosdána.
Publisher: Artisan House Connemara
Artisan House is a publishing company creating beautifully illustrated high-quality books and bespoke publications on a richly diverse range of subjects including food and lifestyle, photography, and the visual arts, music and poetry.
Their creative approach embraces the complete cycle from concept to final delivery including design, editing, translation, illustration, photography, and print management. This enables total oversight of the process to ensure publications of exceptional standard.
Creative Director, Vincent Murphy, and Editorial Director, Mary Ruddy, established Artisan House in 2013. Publications include Celebrating Irish Salmon by Máirín Uí Chómain; Joe Boske The Works by Joe Boske; Connemara by Dorothy Cross; An Art Lover’s Guide to the French Riviera by Patrick J Murphy and Sea Gastronomy: Fish & Shellfish of the North Atlantic by Michael O’Meara (awarded Best Seafood Cookbook in the World Gourmand Awards 2016). Artisan House is a member of Publishing Ireland.
www.artisanhouse.ie