Áine O'Dwyer is an Irish experimental musician, known for her live performances and recordings, which explore the aesthetics of sound and its relationship to environment, time, audience, and structure. Originally from Pallasgreen,

County Limerick County Limerick () is a western Counties of Ireland, county in Republic of Ireland, Ireland. It is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Munster and is located in the Mid-West Region, Ireland, Mid-West which comprises part of the Southern Reg ...

, she studied at the Limerick School of Art and Design (graduating 2006) and in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

at the

Slade School of Fine Art The UCL Slade School of Fine Art (informally The Slade) is the art school of University College London (UCL) and is based in London, England. It has been ranked as the UK's top art and design educational institution. The school is organised as ...

(graduating 2011). She is currently based in London. As a child, O'Dwyer played the

piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...

tin whistle The tin whistle, also known as the penny whistle, is a simple six-holed woodwind instrument. It is a type of fipple flute, a class of instrument which also includes the recorder and Native American flute. A tin whistle player is called a whistl ...

flute The flute is a member of a family of musical instruments in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, producing sound with a vibrating column of air. Flutes produce sound when the player's air flows across an opening. In th ...

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

and

harp The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orchestras or ...

. She now performs primarily on harp and

church organ Carol Williams performing at the West_Point_Cadet_Chapel.html" ;"title="United States Military Academy West Point Cadet Chapel">United States Military Academy West Point Cadet Chapel. In music, the organ is a keyboard instrument of one or mo ...

Live performances

Published accounts of O'Dwyer's live appearances include ''The Music of the Future'' by Robert Barry, who describes O'Dwyer lying on the floor under a baize cloth, plucking the strings of a harp with her feet, during a performance at the Supernormal Festival in

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of symbols, often specifically those of a written language, by means of Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifacete ...

. O'Dwyer's appearance in November 2015 at London's Cafe Oto, in which she dressed as an 18th century scullery maid, backlit with a fan flailing her hair, and played the accordion, was described by ''

The Quietus ''The Quietus'' is a British online music and pop culture magazine founded by John Doran and Luke Turner. The site is an editorially independent publication led by Doran with a group of freelance journalists and critics. Content ''The Quietu ...

'' reviewer Matthew Foster, as "a terrifying sight for the average wuss",' while Chal Ravens of ''Fact Mag'' described a performance by O'Dwyer as "like an invisible banshee haunting the pipes of the church’s organ, O'Dwyer pummels us with gothic drama from her concealed lair above the altar" and experimental artist Graham Dunning described her live sets as "always refreshing, often very melancholy but often with deliberately jarring sections or silly interludes". O'Dwyer has also collaborated with artist Alice Maher on a live show, ''Visitant'', which combined dance, music and visual art, performed at the

Project Arts Centre Project Arts Centre is a multidisciplinary arts centre based in Temple Bar, Dublin, which hosts visual arts, theatre, dance, music, and performance. History Project Arts Centre was founded by Jim FitzGerald and Colm O'Briain in 1967 after a th ...

in 2014 and based performances on her own drawings of mythical creatures.

Albums

Her albums include ''Gallarais'' (2017), ''Beast Diaries'' (2017), ''Music For Church Cleaners'' (2012), ''Locusts'' (2016) and ''Gegenschein'' (2016). ''Music For Church Cleaners'' is an album of pipe organ improvisations, utilising

graphic scores Graphic notation (or graphic score) is the representation of music through the use of visual symbols outside the realm of traditional music notation. Graphic notation became popular in the 1950s, and can be used either in combination with or instea ...

, recorded at St Mark’s Church in

Islington Islington ( ) is an inner-city area of north London, England, within the wider London Borough of Islington. It is a mainly residential district of Inner London, extending from Islington's #Islington High Street, High Street to Highbury Fields ...

, while church cleaners continued to go about their duties. The sounds of the cleaners' activities were included on the recordings. This album was released on cassette and later expanded into a full-length album as ''Music For Church Cleaners Vol I & II'' (2015). Her album ''Locusts'' is No 6 on '' Thump's'' The 25 Best Experimental Albums of 2016 list.'' Thump'', 14 December 2016
Best of 2016, ''The 25 Best Experimental Albums of 2016'', Colin Joyce
/ref>

Discography

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:ODwyer, Aine Year of birth missing (living people) Living people 21st-century Irish women singers Irish women accordionists Irish women harpists 21st-century Irish accordionists Alumni of the Slade School of Fine Art 21st-century Irish harpists Alumni of the Limerick School of Art and Design