New York Festivals Radio Awards 2018 Shortlist for Moore Institute’s NUI Fellow Dr. Deirdre Ní Chonghaile

New York Festivals Radio Awards 2018 Shortlist for Moore Institute’s NUI Fellow Dr. Deirdre Ní Chonghaile

Known as the “Oscars of radio”, the New York Festivals Radio Awards 2018 have shortlisted a programme to which Dr. Deirdre Ní Chonghaile from the Moore Institute contributed some of her research. The Banshee and The Tiger was broadcast 21 January 2018 on RTÉ Lyric FM as part of The Lyric Feature series of documentaries. The programme considers the life and work of ground-breaking American composer Henry Cowell (1897-1965), focusing on his connections with Ireland and his compositions influenced by his Irish heritage and by Irish music and folklore. It is presented by US pianist Guy Livingston, who has performed Cowell’s work internationally and has previously broadcast about Cowell on Australian and Dutch radio, and is jointly produced by Guy and Irish producer Claire Cunningham of Rockfinch Productions with the support of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland.

Deirdre Ní Chonghaile is currently a NUI Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Irish/Celtic Studies working on the archival collections of Rev. Daniel J. Murphy and Prof. Tomás Ó Máille in the Hardiman Library at NUI Galway. In the documentary, she speaks about another element of her research: the work of Henry Cowell and his wife, the American ethnomusicologist and music collector Sidney Robertson Cowell (1903-1995). Deirdre also helped the programme makers to access rare recordings of Aran Islanders made in 1934 and 1955 now held in the New York Public Library and in the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, which feature in the documentary along with many recordings of Cowell’s avant-garde compositions.

You can listen to the programme on the series website: https://www.rte.ie/lyricfm/the-lyric-feature/programmes/2018/0121/934919-the-lyric-feature-sunday-21-january-2018/

It’s available on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/the-lyric-feature/the-banshee-the-tiger-henry-cowell

You can access the NYF international shortlist here: http://www.newyorkfestivals.com/radio/main.php?p=rp2018

This is not the first time that NUI Galway has featured at the New York Festivals Radio Awards. In 2014, PhD candidate in Irish Studies Thérèse McIntyre scooped gold in the Educational category for her Herosongs, an eight part documentary series made with Athena Media for RTÉ Radio One: http://www.nuigalway.ie/about-us/news-and-events/latest-news/nui-galway-student-awarded-gold-medal-at-new-york-festival-awards.html