REMEMBER TO CLICK PLAY ABOVE TO LISTEN TO THIS PODCAST: IRENE, MICK AND HARRY DISCUSS EVERYTHING FROM THE SPECIFIC (WILL THEY GET TOILET BREAKS DURING THEIR PERFORMANCE?) TO THE PHILOSOPHICAL (WHAT EVEN IS MUSIC, ANYWAY? AND WHY IS SOUND ART DIFFERENT?) AGAINST A BACKDROP OF THE SOUNDS OF THE GROUNDS OF ST FINBARRE’S CATHEDRAL.
For a group that has given themselves the moniker of SMALL BIRDS, they’re pretty formidable creatures.
In Mick O’Shea’s studio, artists Irene Murphy and Harry Moore are sitting surrounded by a proliferation of weird and wonderful instruments and noise-makers, alongside Mick.
This is the first ever meeting of SMALL BIRDS, who have formed to provide a live, improvised soundscape for Cónal Creedon’s cover-to-cover reading of his collection of short stories Pancho and Lefty Ride Again, which has been chosen as Cork’s One City One Book 2022.
But of course, each of these artists has an impressive track record of making their own work; Mick and Irene are a couple. Amongst many other things and alongside their individual arts practice, they’ve co-founded the Cork Artist’s Collective residency centre, The Guesthouse, in Shandon.
They are also two-thirds of Domestic Godless, a trio that refers to themselves, no doubt with a total absence of tongue-in-cheek mischief, as a Neo-DaDa Foodist Kollectiv.
Harry Moore works in a variety of media including sound, performance, photography and video.
They’re meeting, but they’re not rehearsing, because everything they will do will be improvised. I’ve gate-crashed their first ever meeting as SMALL BIRDS. And they take to that with great kindness and patience: listen above as Mick O’Shea starts off the conversation by explaining how the project came about.
ANGELUS TO ANGELUS, with SMALL BIRDS and Cónal Creedon, will be on from noon until 6pm in The Crane Lane on Saturday, April 23. It’s a drop-in event.
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