Handprint: Before and Beyond with Thérèse Fahy

Handprint is a new project by pianist Thérèse Fahy, in which she is developing a recital programme around six newly commissioned works by Irish composers Raymond Deane, Siobhán Cleary, Benjamin Dwyer, Gráinne Mulvey, Michael Holohan and Bill Whelan. Funded by the Arts Council, the project was born of a conversation Fahy had with composer Raymond Deane about the fact that the vast majority of contemporary pieces are written for large hands, leaving a huge portion of the piano repertoire simply unavailable to female pianists.

The six commissioned pieces, together called The Handprint Collection, were written specifically with smaller hands in mind, with the intention of creating a body of work accessible to all pianists, regardless of hand size, while being no less technically and musically challenging.

Sundays@noon, Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin

Michael Holohan: The Forge / Siobhán Cleary: Leda and the Swan

with Debussy / Ravel and poetry read by Donal O'Kelly

Central to each concert is two of the new works, and pieces specially selected by the composers as ones that have had an influence on their work, and by Fahy to complete the programme.