Kilkenny Arts Festival’s Secret Music Series is back for 2021.
Again, like last year’s Kilkenny Arts Festival X edition, the series has moved online instead of popping up in gardens and hideaways around Kilkenny city.
Laoise Kelly debuted earlier this week, now it’s the turn of another festival-favourite, Francesco Turrisi.
Grammy-nominated multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi has been defined as a “musical alchemist” and a “musical polyglot” by the press.
He has released five critically acclaimed albums as a leader and two as co-leader (Tarab a cross-boundary innovative ensemble that blends Irish and Mediterranean traditional music, and Zahr, a project that looks at connections between southern Italian traditional music and Arabic music).
His latest piano solo album Northern Migrations was described as “delicate, wistful and wholly engrossing” by the Irish Times.
Francesco is also a member of the celebrated early music ensemble L’Arpeggiata. With l’Arpeggiata he has performed at the most important classical music festivals in Europe and around the world (Turkey, Russia, China, Australia, New Zealand, Brasil, Colombia) and has recorded for Warner, Virgin, Naive and Alpha.
Since 2018 he collaborates with American Grammy award-winning singer and multi-instrumentalist Rhiannon Giddens, on a duo project that seamlessly combines music from the Mediterranean with music from the African diaspora in the Americas. In 2019 Giddens and Turrisi released their critically acclaimed duo album There Is No Other. The album single I’m On My Way was nominated for a 2020 Grammy Award.
Watch: Francesco Turrisi #KAF21
For more on the series, visit kilkennyarts.ie.
