There’s a free lunchtime concert and lecture taking place on Thursday 11 May at the ILAC Library, ILAC Centre on Henry Street, Dublin from 12:45 to 2:30pm. This has been arranged by Maynooth University’s Department of Adult and Community Education ‘Communiversity’ and Music Department, as well as Dublin City Libraries. The event takes place
Dr Francesca Placanica and Aileen Cahill of the Music Department will perform a voice and piano recital. This will feature a lively array of songs from the twentieth-century. In addition, Dr Frank Cullen of the Royal Irish Academy will give a history lecture on the development of Dublin.
About Dr Francesca Placanica
Frencesca has studied opera and classical vocal repertoires, as well as opera acting and theatre acting techniques.
She won the International Solo Voice Competition Seghizzi (2007) in the Category “George Gershwin.” She graduated from musical institutions in Italy as well as the UK and the USA. Frencesca performs extensively as a chamber recitalist soloist in Europe as well as Canada and the USA. She holds a PhD from University of Southampton and is a twentieth-century vocal performance scholar.
Frencesca is currently hosted at Maynooth University, where she is an artistic research fellow. She is also the Principal Investigator of her Irish Research Council funded “En-Gendering Monodrama: Artistic Research and Experimental Production” (2015–17), mentored by Professor Christopher Morris. Her experimental productions are currently touring Ireland. She will also be touring Europe. For more information, please visit her website.
Aileen Cahill, Piano
Aileen Cahill completed her B.A. and Masters in Solo Piano at the Royal Irish Academy of Music. In 2007, she was awarded the prestigious Maura Tessier Piano Bursary for further study. She continued her studies at the Conservatory of Music D.I.T. In 2011, she graduated with a Masters in Piano Accompaniment. She has won many prizes for solo piano as well as concerto, organ, chamber music and piano duet. In addition, she has won prizes for vocal and instrumental duo at various music festivals throughout the country.
Aileen is a regular soloist with the Budweis Philharmonic Orchestra (Czech Republic) at the Musikakademie, Biel/Bienne, Switzerland, as well as with the Sligo Baroque Orchestra. She continues to compete internationally as a soloist. She recently participated in competitions in Taranto, Cantú and Val Tidone in Italy.
Dr Frank Cullen
Dr Frank Cullen works in the Royal Irish Academy on the Irish Historic Towns Atlas project. He is author of Dublin 1847: City of the Ordnance Survey, published by the Royal Irish Academy in 2014. He obtained his PhD in Irish history from the National University of Ireland, Maynooth in 2005. His research compared the cities of Dublin and Belfast in the nineteenth century. His expertise is in urban history with specific interest in the city of Dublin in the early modern and modern period.
Frank is a recent addition to the Communiversity tutoring panel. He will give a short lecture on the development of the City of Dublin using an array of maps from the medieval to modern period.
