Aloys Fleischmann
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Aloys Fleischmann (13 April 1910 – 21 July 1992) was an Irish composer and musicologist. In addition he wrote several books and articles on Irish music.
Life
Fleischmann was born in Munich to Ireland-based German parents on a concert tour at the time. Both parents were musicians; his father, Aloys Fleischmann, Sr., organist and choir master at St. Mary's Cathedral, Cork and his mother, Tilly Swertz Fleischmann was a pianist and piano teacher in Cork.
Fleischmann graduated from University College Cork with a BMus in 1931 and a MA in 1932. That year he went to study composition, conducting and musicology at the University of Munich.
He returned to University College Cork in 1934 where he held the position of Professor of Music until 1980. He founded the Cork Symphony Orchestra in 1934 and was involved in the establishment of the Cork International Choral and Folk Dance Festival (now called Cork International Choral Festival) in 1954. Fleischmann worked alongside Joan Denise Moriarty in setting up the Cork Ballet Company in 1947.
"During that decade [1950s] Fleischmann began to campaign for a professional Radio Éireann string orchestra to be set up in Cork, on the grounds that the nation's cultural resources should be more evenly distributed across the country, as the impact of such a body through performance, broadcasting, teaching and outreach work would be of enormous significance. In 1959, after ten years of unremitting advocacy by Fleischmann, due to the support of the city authorities, the University, Cork politicians, businessmen and 3,000 citizens, Radio Éireann agreed to set up not a string orchestra, but a professional string quartet [1], the RTÉ Vanbrugh Quartet in the city. That was just over fifty years ago. It is to be hoped that the year of Fleischmann's centenary celebrations will not see Cork's quartet removed."
Ruth Fleischmann February 2010
His Sources of Traditional Irish Music was compiled during 40 years of work in collaboration with Micheál Ó Súilleabháin of the University of Limerick and published posthumously in 1998.
Musical works
Fleischman composed in many formats, and his work includes pieces written for chamber music solo instrumental, ballet, chorus and full orchestra.
Notable compositions include:
- Trí hAmhráin (Three Songs), for high voice and piano or orchestra (1937)
- Piano Quintet (1938)
- The Four Masters, overture (1944)
- Clare's Dragoons, for baritone, chorus, war-pipes and orchestra (1944)
- The Golden Bell of Ko, ballet (1948)
- The Red Petticoat, ballet (1951)
- Four Fanfares for An Tóstal (1953)
- Macha Ruadh, ballet (1955)
- Song of the Provinces, for chorus, orchestra and audience participation (1963)
- Songs of Colmcille, for speaker, chorus and chamber orchestra (1964)
- Cornucopia for horn and piano (1969)
- Sinfonia Votiva (1977)
- Omós don Phiarsach (Homage to Padraic Pearse), for mezzo-soprano, speaker and orchestra (1979)
- The Táin, ballet (1981)
- Overture to Time's Offspring (1985)
- Clonmacnoise, for chorus, orchestra and audience participation (1986)
- Games, for chorus, harp and percussion (1990)
Written Works
- Music in Ireland: A Symposium ed., Cork and Oxford, 1952.
- Sources of Irish Traditional Music: An Annotated Catalogue of Prints and Manuscripts 1583-1855, 2 vols., New York, 1998.
Recordings
- Piano Quintet: Hugh Tinney, Vanbrugh Quartet. Marco Polo 8.223888 (1996)
References
- Ruth Fleischmann ed., Aloys Fleischmann: A Life for Music in Ireland Remembered by Contemporaries, Cork (Mercier), 2000. ISBN 1-85635-328-1
- Séamas de Barra, Aloys Fleischmann, Notre Dame/USA and Dublin (Field Day Books), 2006. ISBN 0-946755-32-9