With AVA festival and Forbidden Fruit this weekend and Life Festival last week hoovering up thousands of techno buzzers, a select few hundred are heading to the wilds of Cork for the underground electronic music festival Open Ear off Sherkin Island.
The third edition of Open Ear is another showcase of essential leftfield acts from the Irish electronic scene – with the native artists angle now the festival’s calling card, after starting out through necessity because of funds.
Over the weekend the truly unique and intimate festival will take in techno, electro, electronica, avant-garde electronics, modern composition and all other strands of electronic music – in a stunning location with the Atlantic and local produce to help keep you refreshed over the weekend.
Open Ear introduced a Dimensions-style ‘opening concert’ last night with avant-garde composer and Irish electroacoustic pioneer Roger Doyle; multi-instrumentalist Aine O’Dwyer and Red Bull Music Academy graduate Dreamcycles. There was also a special ‘sleep’ concert by from midnight to 7am with Stephen Stapleton of Nurse With Wound.
But sleep will be secondary from tonight till Sunday, with sets and showcases from Somadrone, Eamonn Doyle, Lakker, Autumns, The Cyclist, Tuuun, Whirling Hall of Knives and loads more.
Add to that workshops, installations, your own local pub – and did we mention the scenery – and it’s a magical weekend dancing at the edge of Ireland.
To add to the FOMO if you’re not going, Emma Cawley’s XXX show on Dublin Digital Radio recently broadcast a great documentary featuring Open Ear director Chris Chapman and booker Dion Doherty, as well as other musicians and visual artists taking part in the festival – including ‘Godfather of Irish electronica’, the composer Roger Doyle – who laughs wondering how Chris and Dion had even heard of him. Listen to the documentary below.
XXX is just one of the many spot-on shows on Dublin Digital Radio – which just won the Judges’ Prize and the Listeners’ Choice for Best Online Radio Station in Europe, 2018 in the Mixcloud Online Radio Awards.
Moo Kid 