West Cork Chamber Music Festival Announces 30th Anniversary Programme

Bantry's renowned West Cork Chamber Music Festival will celebrate its 30th anniversary with yet another stellar line-up of world-class musicians circling around a core of string quartets.

In 1996, the first Festival presented thirteen concerts over a week and thirty years later, in 2025 this has grown to ten days and almost sixty concerts in Bantry House, St Brendan's Church and venues throughout Bantry.

Five international quartets are at the heart of the programme –Doric Quartet from UK;  Ardeo Quartet with musicians from Japan, France and South Korea; Tchalik Quartet from Ukraine; Marmen Quartet consisting of Swedish, Swiss, Irish and New Zealand-born musicians; and Chiaroscuro Quartet which is made up of musicians from Russia, Spain and France.   Their collective repertoire will include much-loved works by Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn and Brahms as well as a wide selection of less familiar works.

The line-up of world-class soloists will be led by Irish pianist Barry Douglas, who also performed at the first Festival in 1996. He will be joined by Norwegian violinist Henning Kraggerud and his musical sons and daughter; Irish violinist Mairead Hickey; Dutch cellist Ella van Poucke; French pianist Nathalia Milstein;  Australian mezzo soprano Lotte Betts-Dean and her violist/composer father Brett Dean; French transverse flute player Anna Besson who will bring her a nocte temporis ensemble with the tenor Reinoud Van Mechelen; French harpist Agnès Clément; American soprano Lucy Fitz Gibbon; American pianist Ryan MacEvoy McCullough;  German – Irish cellist Nuala McKenna; British baroque violinist Rachel Podger and her ensemble Brecon Baroque; Austrian-German violist Emma Wernig and many more.

Ensembles include Pacific Quintet, five young wind players from Ukraine, Honduras, South Korea, Germany and Japan; and Woodpeckers Quartet, a Scandinavian ensemble of recorders led by Kate Hearne.

The Festival will celebrate Ravel's 150th birthday in some style, in particular his exciting and erotic Chansons Madécasses part of a concert about the many faces of love. Shostakovich features with his set of seven mystical songs taken from the poems of the pre-Revolution poet, Alexander Blok. Other highlights include Janáček's Intimate Letters in original version with viola d'amore, Mendelssohn & Beethoven quartets, Kaija Saariaho's Terra Memoria,  cantatas from French Baroque, Bach Suites, Schubert's Death and the Maiden, Brahms' Quintet  and a programme of Haydn which includes his Seven Last Words from Chiaroscuro Quartet with poet Paula Meehan. Candlelit late night concerts feature Britten, Beethoven, Mendelssohn and Schumann. 

The Festival is renowned for its contemporary music and premieres include Deirdre Gribbin's ‘when you think you are looking' with texts by poet Jessica Traynor, Sam Perkin's Celebration Quartet and Brett Dean's And once I played Ophelia.

Throughout the week, the Festival Fringe presents free, family-friendly concerts on  Whiddy, Sherkin, Bere and Heir Islands as well as unusual venues from Skibbereen to Castletownbere.

Former BBC Radio 3 presenter Sean Rafferty will be interviewing musicians in the public Talking Music morning sessions in the Brick Oven restaurant while young musician masterclasses and Ireland's only instrument exhibition run throughout the week

The West Cork Chamber Music Festival is generously supported by the Arts Council of Ireland, Failte Ireland, Crespo Foundation and Cork County Council.

General Booking opens Wednesday 12th March.

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