Cross Currents is a 3-part series narrated by award-winning actor Barry McGovern, exploring contemporary Irish composers and their work. Produced by Athena Media in association with the Contemporary Music Centre and RTÉ lyric fm.

For more, see www.crosscurrents.ie/episode-2/

The second programme explores the change of direction for Irish composers during the period and looks at some of the key motivations for this change. Beginning with well known electronic music composer Roger Doyle, who produced his first LP Oizzo No in 1975 and a follow-up release, Thalia, in 1978, the programme explores Doyle’s seemingly unorthodox approach to new music and its reception in Dublin in the 1970s.

Moving from Dublin to Germany, the programme focuses on the experiences there of Gerald Barry and Raymond Deane, both of whom studied in Cologne, then a hotbed of experimentalism in music and where an international community of composers converged. Also central to the changing face of new Irish music during this time was the establishment in 1976 of contemporary music ensemble, Concorde by US-born Jane O’Leary, an ensemble which continues to this day. Jane will talk about her first experiences of musical life in Ireland and will provide perspective on what it was like to be an unknown, American, female composer trying to follow her musical path in Ireland during the mid 1970s.