Take a tiny church in Dingle, add a loose collection of Ireland's finest butsteadfastly independent songwriters and turn on the cameras. That was Philip King's idea for a new television series. The results are impressive

Just before Christmas, the Co Kerry town of Dingle was invaded by hoards of multi-scented musicians, most of whom were of the singer/songwriter variety. Now, you can say what you like about the species (and yes, some of what you say is allowed to be cynical and smirky), but when they get it right, it's a creative, expressive art form that makes wading through the dross all the more worthwhile. But these musicians were here for a reason - for work, not some expenses-fuelled jolly - they were in Dingle to record, in the tiny, atmospheric church of St James, Other Voices - Songs From A Room, Network 2's 13-part series that starts at the end of this month.

The series gathers together a cultural phenomenon that has been sitting under our collective nose for the past few years: the Irish musician/singer/songwriter who has chosen to negotiate his or her own independent path through the booby-trapped minefield of the music industry. Some of the people involved (The Frames, Maria Doyle Kennedy, Jerry Fish, Katell Keineg, Paddy Casey, Damien Rice, Emmet Tinley, Paul Tiernan, Mundy) have been around a while, have had their fringes singed and fingers burned through involvement with major record companies, and have lived to tell a cautionary tale. Others (including Ger Wolfe, Nina Hynes, Mark Geary, Damien Dempsey, Roesy) have forged ahead by themselves.

One act in particular - Interference - have been marginalised by the peculiar vagaries of the industry to the point where their inclusion has elicited the usual "Whatever-Happened-To . . ." responses. All of the musicians, it would appear, have realised the crucial difference between complete creative control and mortgaging away their lives.

But bringing together, for a week's recording and filming, a group of musicians many consider the cream of new Irish contemporary music - from where did this insane idea spring? Enter Dingle-based Philip King, film producer, radio presenter, musician, and general whirlwind of activity. His RTÉ1 radio show, The South Wind Blows, was where a lot of the music was first heard.

"I listened to a body of music, some of which I'd heard before, and some of which I hadn't," he says. And, in listening to that body of work, he says he recognised the indelible thumbprint of Irish experience. "I began to feel there was a coherent voice, and that people who were beginning to write out of their own Irish experience had a particular tone and quality to it."

To celebrate this independent Irish voice ("the voices that fly beneath the radar of the traditional record company structure," as he puts it) he contacted various people in RTÉ, and the project in time, got the green-light. Then he contacted the one person he thought would be right for the job of presenting the series - Glen Hansard of The Frames.

"When The Frames first began," muses Hansard, "I recall being, or feeling, alienated by people I felt we shouldn't have been - other bands. There are enough enemies in the music business without having enemies among bands, and I always felt that musicians were people other musicians should talk to.

"I can remember saying that if all the bands in Dublin met each other every six months for about six hours, sat down and chatted about this, that and the other - basically, discussing and sharing information - then it would be vital to their success and survival. But the whole idea of economics is that it's good to separate people, even within a band."

Other Voices, says Hansard, was the exact opposite. "Over the course of the week, all the musicians, the people that I really respect and some whom I don't even know, have been so open: Damien Dempsey talking about stage fright, Mundy talking about not being able to watch other people singing because it made him too nervous. People who are giants on stage but who are also quite vulnerable and so alive. Sharing songs."

Sharing strategies, too. If anyone knows anything about survival techniques it's Glen Hansard. Whether he likes it or not, he has become a figurehead of sorts in relation to how to survive the withdrawal of major label backing.

"We're living in a different time in Irish music," he posits. "The energy is different. Maybe the front - the bravado - is coming back due to the increase in public tastes of rock'n'roll music. The cult of personality is once again raising its head.

"What's been recognised is that there are other ways of doing things, of people realising they can put out a record whether or not they have a record deal, and that gives everyone a lot of confidence. Audiences lately, in a way, have become more like patrons of the arts. That's happened to The Frames, I know, where our audiences have furthered our recording."

The effect of playing in front of small audiences in such beautiful surroundings was such that a number of acts involved have experienced miniature career revivals. None more so than Fergus O'Farrell of long-forgotten band Interference. Revered by many who are now well-known names in somewhat more discerning households in Ireland and beyond, O'Farrell retreated to Schull, west Cork in the mid-1990s when Interference became yet another statistic. "We had a cult following," he says, "but no commercial appeal."

Claiming that a lack of business acumen forced him into a commercial cul-de-sac, he says that being asked to perform on Other Voices has given him back his self-respect. "I realised that if you're in a cul-de-sac you've got to reverse out of it and find another way." Now collaborating with Glen Hansard and Nina Hynes, O'Farrell is "thrilled and surprised" that his profile has once again risen.

But what of the profiles that are already raised so far above the parapet it's a wonder they agreed to partake at all? While the two most glaring omissions (David Kitt and Gemma Hayes) couldn't make it on what appear to be logistical grounds, Damien Rice, the Irish success story of 2002, did, and his reason is self-explanatory.

"Sometimes you get to a point where you have a taste of the record company, hype-hype-hype thing," he says, "but while I was excited at the start, it got to a point where I hated it. Playing to large audiences is not what makes me happy; seeing my name in a paper or in the charts doesn't really do anything for me. Money doesn't make me happy; the success thing doesn't make me happy. What makes it for me is walking on stage feeling like I want to be there and starting a song and getting lost in it. That's what Dingle was about."

History is written by observers but rarely by participants, notes Hansard, who in this instance efficiently dwells in both camps. When King asked him to present the series, Hansard agreed on the proviso that he wouldn't introduce anyone he didn't respect. King suggested a few names at the beginning, but, says Hansard (without mentioning any one in particular), "I honestly couldn't stand there and introduce this or that person with my hand on my heart".

Hansard's presenting style is inevitably loose - his introductions are short and anecdotal. King's advice to Hansard: "just be yourself". Yet Hansard reckons he was out of his depth. "I'm just hopeful that, when it goes out on air, I don't look like a complete twat. The thing is, I was asked to do it and I took it on board to do it as best I could. At worst I'll come across as a clown, at best I'll come across as nervous. At the end of day, I'm the guy from The Frames; I'm not going to be chasing TV jobs."

King claims a venture as communal as Other Voices could never have happened with such strength of feeling and commitment if it had been recorded in Dublin. While naysayers might carp at the unfeasibly large display of acoustic-driven, barefaced emotion throughout the series, there is nevertheless a spirit of involvement and inclusivenessrarely witnessed in the insular, too-cool-for-words world of Irish pop/rock art.

"Bringing all the people to one place meant there was an interaction and an exchange of musical notions happening, which was quite traditional," reasons King. "It was like a session - people passed around the guitar from one singer/songwriter to another, even the local people were singing songs.

"Had we done this in Dublin, people would have had to go away in the evening, or would have had to visit the recording studio in the morning, or they'd be working. In Dingle, people took the time to come together, and anyone who could hang around just hung around. Every afternoon, we'd go over to St James and begin to play, and in the evening hundreds of people came along."

What transpired, says King, was a form of worship, of songs seeping into the walls of the church. "It informed the act of making music, as well as its accent, in a way I haven't seen or heard before."

Other Voices - Songs From A Room begins on Network 2 at 9 p.m. on Tuesday, February 25th