Aloys Fleischmann

Aloys Fleischmann was born to German parents based in Ireland. Both were musicians and graduates of the Royal Academy of Music in München. Fleischmann graduated from University College Cork in 1930 with a BA, followed by a master’s degree in 1932. He then continued his studies in composition, conducting and musicology in München.

In 1934 he returned to the University College in Cork, where he taught as a professor until 1980. In 1963 he received a doctorate from the National University of Ireland. Throughout his career Fleischmann initiated projects to establish music as part of people’s lives as well as in education. As a connoisseur of Irish folk music, he tried to create a specifically Irish form of classical music in his compositions. As a conductor of well-known Irish orchestras, he included as many works by Irish composers as possible in his concert programs and directed the Cork International Choral Festival, for which he also commissioned new works. The Fleischmann Choir was later named after him.

Fleischmann’s work of a lifetime was the book Sources of Irish Traditional Music, which, however, was only published posthumously. In 1991 he was made an honorary member of the Royal Irish Academy of Music and received honorary membership in the Royal Dublin Society. In 2010, numerous events were held in Ireland and around the world to Fleischmann’s 100th birthday.

His three songs, submitted in 1952 but composed as early as in 1935, have both Irish and English titles and lyrics: Marbhna Eoghain Ruaidh Uí Néill/Lament for Owen Roe O’Neill, Bíogadh/Away! and An Píobaire/The Piper. Even in these early works Fleischmann tried to express the spirit of Irish folk poetry. He himself was the conductor at the premiere of the orchestral version in 1938 at the Gaiety Theatre in Dublin. Lament for Owen Roe O’Neill is a setting of a poem by O’Carolan (1670–1738), lamenting the death of Irish General Owen Roe O’Neill (ca. 1585-1649). Away! is an adaptation of a medieval poem and The Bagpiper is a poem, both written by contemporary poet Micheál Ó Murchú (1918-1990).