On March 16th, 2020, The National Concert Hall will premiere a musical interpretation of James Joyce's Pomes Penyeach. The show will feature a host of Ireland's most revered contemporary musicians, including the exceptionally talented Lisa Hannigan, Matthew Nolan and Adrian Crowley.

Matthew Nolan is an academic, composer and curator, and spearheads this project. He discovered the work thirty years ago, and has been trying to find a way to express it ever since. "This project is the result of a uniquely Joycean affinity between language and music, and who better to front it than the understated, graceful yet swooning voice of Lisa Hannigan," Nolan says of Pomes Penyeach. 

Originally published in 1927 by Shakespeare & Company, Pomes Penyeach is Joyce's second and final collection of poetry. The collection included twelve poems and a tilly. It sold for one shilling (twelve pennies) or twelve francs, making the poems a penny each."Pomes" is also a play on the French word for apple, "pommes". Many of the works in Pomes Penyeach can be correlated directly with biographical moments in Joyce's life.

Pairing Ireland's greatest poet with one of Ireland's greatest singer-songwriters seems like a no-brainer. Indeed, Hannigan is no stranger to the interpretation of poems. On her last studio album, Hannigan recorded a haunting a cappella version of Seamus Heaney's 'Anahorish.' Pomes Penyeach will be another beautiful addition to the songstress' catalogue. The other musicians featured include Sean Mac Erlaine (reeds & electronics), Cora Venus Lunny (violin & viola) and Cheyenne Mize (violin).

Tickets for this singular live event are available here.