Cillian set to rock the Áras with song sax solo
Cillian McSweeney, 21, from Summerstown in Wilton, Cork, will join members of the Knocknaheeny Youth Music Initiative to perform his own composition, Equal, at President Mary McAleese’s Family Garden Party on Saturday.
They will be sharing the bill with Irish band The Coronas.
“We’re absolutely delighted and thrilled,” Cillian’s mother Angela said.
“The song is about being equal and about how people judge others. It’s about his feelings and about how people shouldn’t judge him because of his wheelchair — he has a lot more to give.
“Cillian has found a way to express himself and his creativeness — this has opened up a whole new world to him.”
Cillian, the eldest of four boys, was born with cerebral palsy, a congenital disorder which affects muscle control.
He is a client of Enable Ireland in East Gate, Cork, and became involved in an inclusive music project with Cork Music Works.
He wrote the lyrics for Equal using his Sound Box communication device which reads his eye movements and transfers the data using predictive text-style technology to produce words.
Then under the guidance of Cork Music Works community musician, Grainne McHale, the band members from Knocknaheeny Youth Music Initiative put music to Cillian’s lyrics.
Ms McHale, who is pursuing a PhD in inclusive music in Trinity College Dublin, sourced an assisted music technology called Sound Beam which allows Cillian to programme different sounds, chords and melodies, and perform with the band.
He will use the movement of his head and feet to trigger switches and beams to play a saxophone solo with the band at Áras an Uachtaráin.
“Cillian has been our star in the last few months,” Ms McHale said.
“He loves music, wanted to learn music and be in a band so we figured out a way of doing it.”
She said the Cork Music Works programme, which promotes an inclusive approach to music education, is highly successful.
“This model works and we’re going to bring it around Ireland,” she said.
She has already established international links with universities in Norway and Rotterdam, which pursue similar courses, and she hopes to deepen the links and collaborations to bring more advanced assisted music technology to Ireland.
She is working with Cillian for her PhD project, using his experience as her case study.
“This project has huge potential on a social and educational basis,” she said.
Cillian hopes to write a song for The Script, who played a homecoming gig to 60,000 fans at the Aviva stadium in Dublin last weekend.
His parents, Angela and Tom and his youngest brother, Craig, 10, will travel to Dublin on Saturday but Andrew, 19, and Josh, 14, will stay at home.
* You can listen to Cillian’s song on YouTube, http://exa.mn/equal
