Bulraga

Bulraga is an Irish vocal quartet founded in Dublin in 2003 by Dublin based singer and composer Aengus Ó Maoláin. One of the group's main aims is to promote contemporary music by presenting it in a context with vocal music from around the world and some popular music within the same performance. In practice, however, Bulraga mainly performs arrangements of world vocal music by Ó Maoláin.

Bulraga could be said to be a split off group from the world famous Anúna as both the founder Ó Maoláin and Rory Musgrave are members of that group also.

The group has only a limited fame but are followed by a close group of supporters awaiting the release of their long expected debut album. So far they have only produced "Live Demo." Bulraga's style is best represented by the two tracks "Messe Ocus Pangúr Bán" and "Alleluia" which show their diversity. Another fine example of their anarchic performance style is "Athaal," a setting of the Moslem Call to prayer performed behind the audiences back, sometimes even outside the venue.

The group consists of four male singers, a tenor, Nigel Smith, a baritone Mark Ennis, a bass Rory Musgrave and a "technique singer" Aengus Ó Maoláin, the groups director who specialises in the odd vocal techniques that define Bulraga's style.

Repertoire

Bulraga present music from every corner of the globe, "Bogoroditsje Djevo" from Russia, "Y Gododdin" from Wales, "Bene n'Gone Sikime" from West Africa and of course "You Have Been Warned" from America. Many of the "traditional" songs in their repertoire are artificial, that is to say, they are recently composed in an idiomatic style, to sound authentic.

The group also perform contemporary music by living Irish composers like Ó Maoláin himself, Benedict Schlepper-Connolly, Nigel Smith and Michael McGlynn. More famous composers like Philip Glass and LaMonte Young make up the rest of their contemporary repertoire.

Performance practice

The group pride themselves on their unusual performance techniques. They frequently perform free unadvertised gigs out of doors around Dublin. They also perform in unusual venues like urban rooftops and ruined churches.

Bulraga likes to surprise their audiences by, for example not actually being in the venue at all until twenty minutes into the gig, or demanding the audience sing along. They also experiment with acoustics and audience reactions by asking the audience to hold an open fifth for eight minutes while they sing simple repeating phrases above to put them into a trance.

Discography

2005 - "Ting 2" (single, Limited release)

2005 - "Bulraga Live in Dublin and Galway" (Limited Release)

2006 - "The Parting Glass" (single, Limited release)

2007 - "Bulraga" (Aranga)

External links

* [http://www.bulraga.com/ Official Bulraga webpage]
* [http://www.mypsace.com/bulraga/ Myspace site]