Irish Timesjournalists look at what is happening in The Arts

Hind, Alberman
The Printing House, TCD

Michael Dungan

Rolf Hind - Die Unenthüllte. Raymond Deane - Parthenia violata. George Crumb - Four Nocturnes. Siobhan Cleary - Fall and Passion. Ravel - Sonata. Xenakis - Dikhthas.

At one point during this terrific free concert by the piano-violin duo of Rolf Hind and David Alberman, violinist Alberman explained how they were exploring territories outside the conventional classical-romantic sound world.

He was almost certainly preaching to the converted. It was a small, committed audience who made their way in the dark evening through Trinity to the intimate Printing House venue for this, the final concert in a new series called New Sound Worlds. But I'm convinced that any concert-goer - say, for example, those who heard American violinist Joshua Bell in recital at the NCH last month - would have been just as captivated by Hind and Alberman as the converted were in TCD.

Had Bell, for instance, sandwiched the Four Nocturnes by his compatriot, George Crumb, between his Schumann and Beethoven, it might well have proved the talk of that recital. It is exquisitely delicate, spellbindingly other-worldly music that mesmerises with its brushing of piano strings and filigree patterns and birdsong in the violin.

There was a gripping, harsher exploitation of sonic potential in pianist Hind's own Die Unenthüllte from 2002, inspired by the harsh history of the church's attempts to eliminate Cathar heretics in the Middle Ages. Snaps and raps on different parts of the body of the piano, in close combination with strange, unpiano-like sounds from plucked prepared strings, created new textures and evoked imagery to match the story.

Raymond Deane's 1999 Parthenia violata contained a more straightforward, though still subtle, connection between the two instruments, the serene opening movement featuring a delicately echoing interplay as of an earlier era but in a contemporary idiom.

Both this piece and Siobhan Cleary's Fall and Passion (2007) were built around beautiful central elegies for violin over dark accompanying chords in the piano, Cleary's epic-inspired miniature otherwise featuring percussive power and a sense of drive and action.

The Ravel Sonata, despite being the conventional touchstone to the rest of the programme, sounded unusually contemporary on this occasion, as though its freshest features were somehow resonating with the much younger pieces by living composers. And Dikhthas, by Xenakis - who likened it to a person with conflicting personalities - provided an exciting finish, with its adventure and wild virtuosity.

True champions of new music, the duo performed with rare levels of commitment, finesse and - above all - persuasiveness.

I Can't Make It Alone
Project, Dublin

Christine Madden

Just a week after the revival of CoisCéim's Knots, based on the writings of RD Laing, a new piece comes to the Project stage - this time by Rex Levitates, inspired by the eponymous song by Dusty Springfield. It's a testament to the infinite diversity of human creativity and relationships that these two shows, which couldn't be more different in style and tone, both examine the minefield of human intercourse (physical and emotional) with success and insight.

With this piece, it seems a new focus and eloquence has emerged in Liz Roche's choreography, enhanced by her corps of dancers - and with the likes of Justine Doswell, Robert Jackson and Ríonach Ní Néill , you could hardly put a foot wrong, so to speak. The versatile company, nicely completed by Jazmin Chiodi, Philip Connaughton, Stéphane Hisler and Grant McLay, makes up an odd-numbered cast with which to play out the uncontainable (and unfortunately diametrically opposed) urges of neediness and repulsion.

Roche's choreographic style carries a certain weight, as though dancers are performing on a planet with stronger gravity and a denser atmosphere. It works well with this company and piece, in which the dancers somehow remain detached and dispassionate in their expression as their bodies work through the consequences of not being able to make it alone - but terribly wishing they could as they shove each other away only to form new configurations of closeness.

As well as a sometimes tattered and worried soundtrack of I Can't Make It Alone, the sound design by David Turpin well suits the piece. In Joe Vanek's design, the stage is marked out by two rows of chains reaching up in a slant from concrete pylons, making the audience feel as if it is coming to the end of a bridge. The dancers find good use for the row of chairs along the right side of the stage; a selection of red Ikea-like furniture to the left looks interesting but sadly isn't put to much use.

The one element of the production that falls flat is when individual dancers make occasional soundbite announcements into a microphone, most of which come across as platitudes. This device at the close could have been amusing but unfortunately just feels like what it portrays: an easy way out of the difficulty of ending. Otherwise, a fine production by Roche and her company.

Runs until Dec 15