Arts Week with Judy Murphy

When jazz musician Conor Guilfoyle sent choreographer David Bolger a message during Covid, saying he’d like to work with David’s dance company, CoisCéim, it started a creative collaboration that resulted in a unique, high-energy, jazz-era dance show, The Piece With the Drums, which comes to the Town Hall Theatre next Tuesday, November 12.

David was intrigued when he read Conor’s message.

“He explained that he was thinking of doing something with jazz percussion and dance, and asked if we would be interested,” the choreographer recalls.

Drummer Conor is one of the jazz world’s foremost percussionists, who has played and recorded with top names in the field and David knew working with him could be a great creative experience.

“I always try to find something that interests me that I haven’t done before. You always feel you want to discover something new every time you work on a piece.”

Such energy and curiosity has led to CoisCéim – which marks its 30th anniversary this year – becoming  one of Ireland’s leading dance companies.

And so, Conor and CoisCéim began the process and the show received a terrific critical response when it premiered in January 2023.

For David, the idea of working with percussion – “doing something so elemental” – resonated, especially during the strange days of Covid, when the project began.

He saw it as an opportunity to explore “vibrations and rhythms, and how our rhythms worked in such a different way at that time”.

Rhythms and vibrations formed the starting point for a series of workshops during the pandemic, when the world had become quiet, offering people a chance to hear things in a different way.

Crucial to the process was exploring how a drum kit worked.

“In my ignorance, I never realised how melodic the drums are and Conor makes them sing,” David says. “There is a beauty in the way he plays and when I started to understand that, I was interested to see what would happen when if we took them away.”

Pictured: There are five dancers in the show and each has a unique relationship with Conor Guilfoyle’s jazz percussion.