Historical Documents of the Irish Avant-Garde

Abstract

Before you begin reading the articles in this book and listening to the recordings on the Aisteach Foundation’s website, I have a confession to make – all of the composers and artists are fictional. The Aisteach Foundation and the Historical Documents of the Irish Avant-Garde are a communal thought experiment, a revisionist exercise in “what if?”, a huge effort by many people to create an alternative history of avant-garde music in Ireland, to write our ancestors into being and shape their stories with care. We played fast and loose with history and the truth and we like to think Flann O’Brien would have approved. I am extremely grateful to the Arts Council of Ireland for funding this project and allowing me to collaborate with the contributors listed below. If you feel there’s something we missed, something you want to have happened and would like to bring into being, please let us know. This project is dedicated with love to Bob Gilmore. Dr. Jennifer Walshe, President, Aisteach Foundation