Gerald Barry’s operatic take on Lewis Carroll’s classic Alice tale is about to get its Irish premiere, writes Cathy Desmond

Despite success with previous productions, John O’Brien’s new opera wasn’t granted the funding for an extended run, writes Cathy Desmond

Murderer Graham Dwyer is sharing a landing in Midlands Prison with one of the most notorious sex offenders, who is serving life for raping two children.

Wide Open Opera’s ‘Nixon in China’ commemorates the late American president’s meeting with Mao Zedong in 1972, writes Alan O’Riordan.

IT STRUCK a sensitive nerve when the poet WJ Mc Cormack, aka Hugh Maxton, this week defended Aosdána’s annual funding of €2.7 million by mentioning that Fair City cost €11 million. This fact was met, according to an RTÉ report, with laughter from the floor of Aosdána’s general assembly meeting at the Royal Hospital, Kilmainham.

The 30-year-old rapist of two children joins 12 other sex offenders serving a life sentence in Irish prisons. While he will be able to start applying for parole after he serves seven years, the average term of life sentences is just over 17 years.

New Music Dublin returns for the second year of an initial five-year commitment this spring, running from March 6-9 at the National Concert Hall.

House of Cards makes a welcome return on Netflix, and Frank looks just as nasty as ever.

Classics, whether in music, literature or theatre, are surely best enjoyed as originally conceived?

Cork Choral Festival is more than competition, it is primarily about the joy of singing, writes Declan Townsend

The National Chamber Choir and the Gentlemen Singers both perform at Cork Choral Festival on May 4, writes Nicki ffrench Davis

A number of events are taking place in Galway today to remember murdered Swiss student Manuela Riedo on the third anniversary of her death.

CONVICTED murderer and rapist Gerald Barry has been given a concurrent two-year sentence for assaulting his former partner and their young son two months before he raped and murdered Swiss student Manuela Riedo.

THE organiser of a fundraiser for murdered Swiss student Manuela Riedo has given an assurance that he has “at all times had approval” from her parents for the concert.

THE parents of a Swiss student murdered just days after she arrived in Galway hope to travel to the city for a charity night in her memory.

EVIL Gerald Barry was handed a double life sentence with a chilling warning that if he was released he would rape and kill again.

GERALD BARRY, the 29-year-old Galway city man who is serving life for the murder of Swiss student Manuela Riedo, was given two concurrent life sentences yesterday for the double rape of a French student in August 2007 – committed just seven weeks before he murdered Ms Riedo in October 2007.

MR JUSTICE Paul Carney was emphatic yesterday when, in Galway, he sentenced murderer and double rapist Gerald Barry, aged 29, to two life terms for raping a French student.

If previous convictions were taken into account and Barry denied bail, Manuela might still be alive, writes Jennifer Hough.

Gerald Barry, the 29-year-old Galway city man who is serving life for the murder of Swiss student Manuela Riedo, was given two concurrent life sentences today for the double rape of a French student in August 2007, committed just weeks before he murdered Ms Riedo.

THE Galway man who murdered Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has been remanded in custody pending sentence for raping a French student at knife-point.

The Galway man who murdered Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has been remanded in custody pending sentence for raping a young French woman at knife point in 2007.

THE Galway man who murdered Swiss student Manuela Riedo has pleaded guilty to raping a French tourist.

The Galway man who murdered Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo in October 2007 has now pleaded guilty to raping a French woman in 2007.

A jury at the inquest into the death of Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has recommended that no student should ever walk the line between Ceannt Station and Renmore in Galway city alone.

The inquest into the death of Swiss student Manuela Riedo is due to get underway in Galway today.

A CANDLE flame flickered in front of framed photographs of murdered Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo as her parents launched a new foundation for rape and sexual assault victims in Dublin yesterday.

The family of Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo have set up a foundation for victims of rape and sexual assault across Europe.

An Irish publican is setting up a new foundation in honour of Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo, who was murdered in Galway in October 2007.

THE authorities absurdly suggested during the week that Conor Casby, the artist who painted the controversial portraits of Brian Cowen, was guilty of indecency, incitement to violence and criminal damage.

A Galway man has been jailed for life for the murder of Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo in October 2007.

The jury at the trial of a Galway man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo in October 2007 has been sent home for the night.

A GALWAY man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has told a jury at the Central Criminal Court that her death was “an accident”.

A Galway man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has told a jury at the Central Criminal Court that her death was “an accident”.

THE man accused of murdering Swiss student Manuela Riedo in October 2007 sold Ms Riedo’s mobile phone to his sister’s boyfriend nine days after the killing, the Central Criminal Court has heard.

The Central Criminal Court has heard that the DNA of a Galway man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo in October 2007 was found inside a condom that had been found at the scene of her death.

THE trial of a Galway man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has heard that calls made from his mobile phone bounced off a mast in the Lough Atalia area, where her body was found, on the night of her murder.

The trial of a Galway man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo has heard that calls made from his mobile phone bounced off a mast in the Lough Atalia area on the night of her alleged murder.

A jury at the Central Criminal Court has heard that Swiss teenager Manuelo Riedo died from strangulation.

THE trial of a man accused of murdering Swiss teenager Manuela Riedo in Galway in 2007 has heard that his DNA was found in a used condom near her body.

A popular Swiss student was strangled to death just two days after she arrived in Ireland to learn English, a court heard today.

ONE minute he was the witty brains behind Bertie, the next he was Taoiseach. Taoiseach without opposition. Taoiseach by acclaim. Easy peasy.

Despite the slowdown in the economy, An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern can take justifiable satisfaction from this country’s continuing economic success, especially when compared with other countries that were for so long considered models of economic achievement.