Sundays at Noon Concert Catch-up, Ronan Guilfoyle - Phantom City II

Filmed in the Sculpture Hall of the Hugh Lane Gallery January 26th 2025
Ronan Guilfoyle - Phantom City II
A Dance Suite for two accordions, soprano saxophone, electric bass and drums
Dermot Dunne - accordion
Martin Tourish - accordion
Nick Roth - soprano saxophone
Ronan Guilfoyle - bass
Matthew Jacobson - drums
Phantom City II
I - Tango-esque
II - Ratchenitsa Hamsadhwani
III - The Slow Waltz
IV - Out West
I wrote the first Phantom City in 1995 - a kind of chamber concerto for accordion, accompanied by soprano saxophone, bass guitar, and drums. It was commissioned by the Boyle Arts Festival and written for the virtuoso accordionist Dermot Dunne. It was called ‘Phantom City’ because all of the music in the piece had a very urban quality to it. It was definitely music of the city, though not of any clearly defined city, although it did have roots in that most urban of music - jazz. I really enjoyed writing that piece for Dermot and thirty years later I’m very happy to be revisiting similar territory with him, and having the opportunity to add another great accordionist to the mix - Martin Tourish.
I decided to keep the same accompanying instruments as in the original Phantom City - soprano saxophone, electric bass, and drums, and also decided to keep an urban atmosphere to the music. For the new piece I decided to write a dance suite. Dance suites have a great history in classical music, particularly in the Baroque era, but none of the dances in this suite would have been familiar to Baroque composers - even the waltz in the third movement, though perhaps related to the baroque minuet, has its origins in the 19th Century rather than the 17th. The first movement is based on the Argentinian tango, the second movement combines a traditional Bulgarian Dance - a Ratchenitsa - with an Indian Raga - Raga Hamsadhwani. The third movement is the aforementioned waltz, and the final movement is based on the 6/8 groove found in many dances from West Africa.
With all of the movements I take great liberties with the traditional dances, sometimes moving away from them and then returning, and traditional players of these dances would possibly not recognise these versions as being ‘true’ versions of these dances. But I hope they all evoke the atmosphere and mood of the original models from which they come. The accordions are strongly featured throughout, especially in the second movement, where they are only accompanied by the drums, and in the cadenza that ends the third movement. The soprano saxophone, the bass and the drums also have opportunities to improvise and create solos of their own, and though the piece is written to feature the accordions, ‘Phantom City II’ is also a truly ensemble piece.