THE opening concert of Limerick Early Music Festival 2026 is set to be a thoroughly Limerick occasion. On Friday March 20 at 8pm, Saint Mary’s Cathedral will host Concealed and Revealed — a programme rich in sacred and secular music spanning the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries, performed almost entirely by artists who call Limerick home.
Ancór Chamber Choir and Saint Mary’s Cathedral Choir take centre stage alongside guest vocal soloists Emma English (soprano) and Sarah-Ellen Murphy (contralto), both Limerick-based singers of considerable standing.
They will be joined by the LEMF Chamber Orchestra — featuring Limerick musicians Andrew Jordan, Michael Dooley, and Alejandro Angel — and the LEMF 2026 McCullagh-Ó Briain Emerging Artist, Dylan Donegan.
The evening will be directed by two distinguished figures in Irish classical music. Peter Barley, Cathedral Organist at Saint Mary’s, conducts alongside Cecilia Madden.
A notable addition to the podium is Vlad Smishkewych, the Limerick-based Lyric FM broadcaster, who joins as guest conductor for a set of madrigals by Maddalena Casulana — a composer remarkable not only for the beauty of her writing but for being the first woman to have a substantial body of music published in the Western tradition.
The programme’s title speaks directly to this year’s Festival theme, Masks and Masques, which explores the symbolism of masks as tools of survival and celebrated elements of performance traditions across world cultures.
The music ranges across cantatas, motets, madrigals, and virtuosic instrumental pieces, with texts freighted with hidden meanings — images of night and moon, sensual metaphors of budding flowers and feminine imagery both sacred and secular.
Smishkewych promises an evening that will linger. “Add to this two of Limerick’s best-known choirs, and the return of our Emerging Artist performance, and it will be an unforgettable experience,” he said.
Full details and booking are available at www.limerickearlymusic.com.