Night One: Sophie Cooper + Eimear Reidy // Strider

Presented by New Music Dublin with support from the Arts Council & in partnership with RTÉ and the National Concert Hall. The Diatribe Stage is supported by the Arts Council.  

Sophie Cooper and Eimear Reidy received support from Leitrim County Council Arts Office. 

Sophie Cooper is a sound artist who (hcmf//) call “a crucial member of Yorkshire’s far-reaching experimental music scene”. Working across composition, sound design, spatialised sound, music education and performance, Sophie makes long term, collaborative project-based works that are positioned in community-facing locations.

Land and Brass was an exhibition and body of work commissioned by the Rochdale Culture Coop working with sound artist Sophie Cooper and Milnrow brass band to combine contemporary experimental sound and composition with the local Rochdale/Pennines tradition of brass music, culminating in an installation at Rochdale Exchange in June 2025.

During a visit to the legendary Rath’s Trombones in Huddersfield, Sophie spotted a trombone so broken and bashed that it looked to be almost melting over the edge of a high shelf and it made her question – in a world where overconsumption is rife and common, is there a possibility to make instruments like this have one final blast at sounding again?

The composition Echoes and Reclamation was written for a brass quintet formed from the Milnrow band and was composed using concepts of recycling and reuse. Ideas are chopped and elongated, creating a kind of echoed landscape of sound. The town of Milnrow is referenced directly in its main melody line which follows its cartographical boundary, and through the use of field recordings. The work is re-imagined at New Music Dublin 2026 in collaboration with Eimear Ready on cello.

Strider is the longtime duo of Joanna Mattrey and Steve Long. The group’s alchemical procedures fuse together field recordings, found objects, derelict instruments, keyboards and bowed strings to create ambient soundscapes in miniature. Strider has performed across the United States, and make their European début with this performance at New Music Dublin 2026.