Digital Commons Network^™

A Portfolio Of Compositions, Anne-Marie O'Farrell

Research Theses

The works in the attached portfolio address a number of compositional focal points: to bring together diverse strands of musical influence into sustained musical argument, across various large-scale media; to enlarge and explore the musical language of the harp, including the lever harp; and to integrate received materials into new music so as to create a different context while acknowledging musical inheritance. These combine with the exploration of inherent instrumental colour within my approaches to rhythm, harmony, melodic transformation, structure and the use of text to demonstrate the development of my compositional style during my PhD study. The commentary opens …

"Then To Death Walked, Softly Smiling": Violence And Martyrdom In Modern Irish Republican Ballads, Seán Ó Cadhla

Articles

This article critically considers the representation of death within the song tradition of modern Irish Republicanism. I explore how such representations have changed in parallel with the various ideological metamorphoses that Irish Republicanism has undergone, specifically in the twentieth century. I argue that the centrality of self-sacrifice has resulted in the development of ballad narratives that deliberately obfuscate on the issue of Republican violence, resulting in the deaths of all Republican militants (regardless of cause or context), ultimately portrayed as a form of heroic self-martyrdom.

San alt seo, déantar anailís chriticiúil ar léiriú an bháis i dtraidisiún amhránaíocht Phoblachtach na …