It’s the 2025 Christmas special! Dara presents his new seasonal story, hot off the press! In ‘Early Service’, an exhausted daughter sits down with her philandering father for their annual Christmas night out. Can they survive their oppositional tendencies? Will something magical help them transcend their differences? Why does the holiday mean such different things to each of them?
The 2025 Christmas Special! – Episode 234 Read More »
In this episode it is Dara’s great pleasure to sit down and have a long overdue chat with his great friend and former college buddy, Aengus Devine. Aengus is a gifted musician, singer and songwriter, and has sustained a long career as a professional musician. At the end of their long and winding conversation, Aengus plays his lovely new Christmas single ‘God Save Christmas’.
In this episode, Dara responds to a music podcast he found surprisingly moving by exploring the idea of connection. Why do certain things or people connect with us more powerfully than others? What is it that speaks to us about a particular individual, or their work? And what is it about music and musicians and movies and actors that can so enrapture us?
Innocence, Sex, and Sophistication: Who Do We Connect With and Why? – Episode 141 Read More »
Following the previous episode’s last-minute production, Dara does another late night recording, this time in the wind and rain, with at least two interruptions from a sleeping dog. He’s determined to maintain his line, and that means he refuses to put out another delayed episode.
Maestro! Bradley Cooper’s Bravura Take on Bernstein – Episode 136 Read More »
In this week’s episode, Dara looks at Ireland’s storied relationship with the Eurovision Song Contest, a competition in which Ireland were once utterly dominant but has long since become an arena in which they are serial losers. He recalls his own experiences of watching the event as a child and how it was a source of great national pride and fascination. Ireland was a different country then, a different entity in a very different stage of its development and one that was about to change beyond all recognition.
In this episode, Dara finally achieves a long-term goal of the podcast – he gets his wife to sit down for an interview at Hashtag Blessed!
After hearing his wife listening to a selection of different piano pieces in preparation for a class, Dara realised he wanted to talk about motifs. He discusses motifs in the work of film score composers before warming to the idea of motifs in one’s life – what themes and fascinations have recurred over a lifetime? What has been circled back to? What has been underscored and reiterated?
The Attraction of Certain Instruments, or Oh, What a Lovely Wand! – Episode 87 Read More »
Dara ain’t gonna lie – this was a monster effort to produce! A little recital with his wife, an unexpected but most welcome interview with his daughter, and a new story for the season that’s in it, all pulled together on the day of the episode. And done while sick.
The 2022 Christmas Special! – Episode 83 Read More »
When writing for this blog I typically start with the kernel of an idea in my mind that I trust will carry enough discursive and imaginative heft to justify the thousand or so words that follow. What I have discovered though is that by the time I press ‘publish’ that kernel may not be in
Copyright © 2024 The ClearOut, All rights reserved.