Venue: St Nicholas Collegiate Church, Galway
Date: 07 May 2024 at 1:10pm
Price: Entry is free, donations are welcome
ConTempo Quartet will perform a specially curated programme in honour of Bealtaine as part of Lunchtimes with ConTempo.
Bealtaine is one of four main seasonal festivals in the Celtic Calendar (Imbolc, Lughnasadh and Samhain are the others). It marks the movement from spring into summer and traditionally putting cattle out to pasture. It is a time associated with fire and flames, as bonfires were often lit to protect cattle, crops and the people who tended to them. Bealtaine was also a time to ward off fairies through a host of traditional practices including placing three black coals under the butter churn so the fairies wouldn’t steal the butter!
The Ceol Bhealtaine programme features classical and contemporary works that contemplate the movement towards summer. ConTempo Quartet will perform Haydn’s beautiful ‘Birds’ String Quartet, Dutch composer Chiel Meijering’s atmospheric Candybox and excerpts from Grieg’s String Quartet Op. 27.
Entry is free, all are welcome. Donations are welcome. No booking is required.