The NCH Lifetime Achievement Award has been bestowed on Galway composer and musician Jane O’Leary, in her 80th year, in honour her outstanding contribution to music in Ireland.

A concert to mark Jane’s many achievements will take place at the National Concert Hall on Friday, October, 24, featuring the National Symphony Orchestra, conductor Kensho Watanabe, and Galway’s ConTempo Quartet.

They will perform her composition Triptych for string quartet and orchestra, as well as works by Tchaikovsky and Mussorgsky.

Jane, who was born in the USA, has lived in Ireland since 1972 and has influenced contemporary Irish music in many ways. She is a composer, performer, educator, a staunch advocate for new music and the founder of the Concorde Ensemble.

A co-founder of Music for Galway, she served as its artistic director for many years and she was also involved in establishing the Galway Music Residency in 2002.

ConTempo which was founded as part of the Galway Music Residency has been Galway’s Ensemble in Residence since 2003. The quartet will join the National Symphony Orchestra and conductor Kensho Watanabe to perform Jane’s Triptych, which premiered in 2020 and in which she set out to capture “a sense of fragility, transparency, light and shade, and the fascination clouds hold for us all. . .”

Celebrated for its orchestration, melodies, and emotional intensity, Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Fantasy Overture is built around three themes representing Friar Laurence, the two feuding families, and the doomed relationship between the young lovers, lit up by a yearning, soaring melody.

Mussorgsky’s image-filled Pictures at an Exhibition brings 10 paintings to musical life. Highlights include the recurring ‘Promenade’ variations, the playful ‘Les Tuileries’, grotesque ‘Hut on Hen’s Legs’ belonging to the witch Baba Yaga, and imposing pomp and power of ‘The Great Gate of Kiev’.

Jane O’Leary’s remarkable legacy as a composer, performer and facilitator, sees her join an NCH roll of honour that includes James Galway, Veronica Dunne, the Chieftains Paul Brady, the Vanbrugh Quartet, John O’Conor, Shane MacGowan, John Kinsella and Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin

The concert in her honour will take place at 7.30pm on October 24 on the main stage of the National Concert Hall and tickets are €39, available from www.nch.ie.

Pictured: Multi-faceted: Jane O’Leary.