ICTMD Ireland Oirdhearchas Award
The principle aims of ICTMD Ireland are to promote the advancement of the study, practice, documentation, preservation and dissemination of traditions of music and dance, including folk, popular, classical, urban, and other genres, of Ireland, its diaspora, and of all musical cultures investigated by researchers and educators based in Ireland. The ICTMD Ireland Oirdhearchas Award will be presented to a person who has contributed in a very significant way through their research/practice to furthering the aims and vision of the society. The recipient of the award will have made a continuous and important contribution over many years to the scholarly study of music/dance.
Oirdhearchas is an old Irish word, incorporating the qualities of excellence, dignity and worth, and also confers a title of honour on the recipient (T. O’Neill, English-Irish Dictionary, 1922, p.558). The recipient’s work will exemplify these traits, embodying the ethos of the award.
The awardee, from Ireland or abroad, will be chosen by the committee of ICTMD Ireland. Any committee member may propose an awardee. This award carries no financial remuneration.
Recipients of the Oirdhearchas Award
2021 - Thérèse Smith
Thérèse Smith received her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Brown University, Rhode Island. She lived for 10 years in the U.S.A. studying, lecturing, and completing field work in Mississippi, Kentucky, and Rhode Island. Her research was funded by the National Endowment for the Arts (Folk Arts Program), Mississippi Arts Commission (production costs and documentation for the LP Moving the Spirit: Music of Worship in Clear Creek, Mississippi), Charlotte E. Newcombe Foundation, Institute of Intercultural Studies, and Frances E. Harnish Foundation. She has been invited to give seminars and lectures at the universities of Alabama, California, Kentucky, Maine, and Rhode Island, and at the major universities in Ireland.She served as Hon. Secretary of the Cumann Cheol Tíre Éireann / Folk Music Society of Ireland from 1992 to 1997, is co-editor of Éigse Cheol Tíre and inaugural Chair of the International Council for Traditional Music Ireland. Her 2004 book publication Let the church Sing! (University of Rochester Press) was nominated for the Alan P. Merriam prize, awarded for the most outstanding English-language monograph published in a given year.
She served as Head of the UCD School of Music from 2008 to 2011, served as Deputy Head of School from 2005-8, and is currently serving as Deputy Head of School (2018-2021). She has served as external examiner for degree programmes at Queen's University Belfast, the University of Limerick, Dundalk Institute of Technology, Waterford Institute of Technology, and Dublin City University/Mater Dei Institute.
2025 - Tony Langlois (1960-2024)
Tony Langlois was an ethnomusicologist with a background in North African musical traditions. He taught sound and other kinds of media at Mary Immaculate College in Limerick. He curated the music programme in the IndieCork Festival of Film and Music in Cork. He was a founding member of ISSTA.
Tony’s creative practice included live electronic improvisation, soundscape composition, film soundtracks and songs. Many of these works were the result of collaborative engagements with sound artists, film-makers and performers.