A collective of Irish percussionists, playing everything from huge shows that fill the stage with instruments to intimate concerts, school workshops and street performances.
I founded Bangers and Crash and direct the group. It is a collective rather than a fixed band: depending on the project, we are anything from a duo to a sextet with a stage full of instruments, sometimes joined by singers, composers or a crowd of young musicians.
It all started organically. Our first outings were school workshops for West Cork Music, with Clare O'Keeffe and Caitríona Frost, and among our first important concerts were my Rising Stars concert at the National Concert Hall in February 2015 and WoodMetalWater at the Sounds from a Safe Harbour festival in Cork later that year.
Our aim is to use the huge range of sounds and the magic of percussion to open doors, and to make music fun and open to everyone. We play new music, much of it written for us, alongside classics of the percussion repertoire by composers such as Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Louis Andriessen, John Cage and Thierry de Mey.
Short film
Bangers and Crash: An Immersive Experience
A short film about our 2024 project in Limerick, part of that year's tour, where we worked with music students from the area and the composer Brian Irvine.
Filmed and edited by Jack Deacon (Plural Video), with Sound Waves Music Space. Supported by the Arts Council.
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Bangers and Crash prove a reliably cohesive and entertaining ensemble… If they come to your town, seek them out.
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As well as the banging and crashing the group's name suggests, we also get subtle moods and textures… Energising and enjoyable.
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…buried by the raw power and immediacy of live percussion.
Concerts so far
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2025
- 30 May, Music for Wexford: duo concert with Caitríona Frost
- Glasgow Cathedral Festival: Irene and Linda Buckley's score for Metropolis, played by Paddy Nolan and Patrick Lynch
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2024
- September–November, autumn tour to Limerick, Cork, Carlow and Galway: the premieres of Brian Irvine's CALL [I am] here! and my Up (Sextet No. 2), with local students joining in
- 25 August, Fuddlefest, Co. Wexford: a gong bath
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2023
- 16 and 17 September, Triskel Arts Centre, Cork, and Hugh Lane Gallery, Dublin: duo concerts
- 26 February, National Concert Hall, Dublin: duo concert with Caitríona Frost
- 30 January – 3 February, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
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2022
- 16 October, PIMA! Fest, Glór, Ennis: sextet, with students from Music Generation Clare
- 23 September, Culture Night, Blessington: duo concert
- 2 August, Windmill Lane Studios, Dublin: recording percussion for Arthur Sharpe's score for the BBC drama The Following Events Are Based on a Pack of Lies
- 24–28 January, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
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2021
- 8 and 9 November, Cork International Film Festival, Everyman: Irene and Linda Buckley's new score for Metropolis, live with the film
- 21 August, Birr Festival of Music: workshop and duo concert
- 20–22 June, Cork Midsummer Festival, Elizabeth Fort: new sextets by Amanda Feery, Tom Lane and me
Earlier concerts, 2014–2020
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2020
- 20–24 January, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
- 12 January, First Fortnight festival, Dublin: How Aria? with Irish National Opera, and the premiere of Amanda Feery's As above, so below
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2019
- 2–11 October, Music Network tour, from the Sugar Club, Dublin, to Glór, Ennis: eight concerts as a trio, with the premiere of my Cross | Paths
- 17–20 September, community and school workshops: ahead of the tour
- 21 and 22 January, Clonmel: workshops in four schools
- 14–18 January, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
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2018
- 12–14 November, ESB head office, Dublin: Science Week workshops
- 30 June, West Cork Chamber Music Festival fringe, Bantry
- 22–26 January, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
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2017
- 23 October, Irish Composers' Collective, Dublin: new pieces for percussion duo
- 3 and 4 June, West Cork Chamber Music Festival fringe, Bantry: workshops
- 4 March, New Music Dublin, National Concert Hall: John Cage's Living Room Music, with Aoife Ní Bhriain
- 23–27 January, Tuning Up: ten schools in Co. Cork
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2016
- 14 December, Richmond Barracks, Dublin: Making Sense of Sound, with children from Inchicore
- 5 October, Kaleidoscope Night, Bello Bar, Dublin
- 2 October, Westport Arts Festival: concert and workshop
- 19 June, Body&Soul festival, Woodlands Stage: trio
- 18 June, Arthur's, Dublin: trio
- 10 and 11 June, Killaloe Chamber Music Festival: workshops and a duo concert
- 7 February, Quarter Block Party, Cork: pieces played in shops, on things from the shops
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2015
- 19 September, Sounds from a Safe Harbour, MTU Cork School of Music: WoodMetalWater, with the premiere of my Water Drumming
- 23 and 26 February, primary schools in Cork: concerts and workshops
- 17 February, National Concert Hall, Dublin: my Rising Stars concert
- 6 February, Quarter Block Party, Triskel Arts Centre, Cork: Thierry de Mey's Musique de Table
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2014
- 6–10 October, Tuning Up: school workshops as a duo
- 20–31 January, Tuning Up: where it began: school workshops as a duo
Videos
Our YouTube channel
Play video: Up (Sextet No. 2) – Alex Petcu
Play video: Pitter Patter – Alex Petcu
Play video: Sextet No. 1 – Alex Petcu
Play video: Tower of Pigeons – Amanda Feery
Play video: Rotations – Tom Lane
Play video: Cross | Paths – Alex Petcu
Play video: Musique de Table – Thierry de Mey
Play video: Water Drumming – Alex Petcu
On record
In 2022 we recorded percussion at Windmill Lane Studios in Dublin for Arthur Sharpe's score for the BBC One drama The Following Events Are Based on a Pack of Lies, which won the Ivor Novello Award for Best Television Soundtrack in 2024. In the words of its label, Silva Screen Records, it is “an amalgam of harpsichords, harps, strings and marimbas driven along by the beats of the Bangers & Crash percussion group”.
More of our music is on SoundCloud.
Workshops for schools
Our school workshops are part workshop, part concert: fun, hands-on and suited to any age group. We have given well over 100 of them, many for Tuning Up, West Cork Music's outreach programme with Cork County Council's Arts Office, where two of us (usually Caitríona Frost and me) visit ten schools in Co. Cork in a week. We have also worked with Music Generation Clare, Sound Waves Music Space in Limerick and Common Ground in Inchicore, Dublin, and at festivals from Westport to Killaloe and Bantry.
No two workshops are the same, and many have a theme that takes us around the world. Some of the things we cover:
- Rhythm: pulse, counting, dynamics and playing together.
- Listening (an important skill), to our own pieces for marimba and vibraphone.
- More than 30 instruments from all over the world, and the textures they and our bodies can make.
- Conducting: volunteers take turns controlling the ensemble.
- Matthias Schmitt's Ghanaia, with everyone joining in on jungle and storm sounds.
- Cartoon sound effects, film music, and percussion in rock, jazz, classical and world music.
“The group showed us a wide variety of percussion instruments and played beautiful sounds and music for us. Percussion instruments were explained and there was direct participation by the children, a lovely time was had by all.”
Presentation Primary School, Bandon
The players
Bangers and Crash draws on a pool of percussionists from around Ireland:
- Emma King
- Caitríona Frost
- Pat Lynch
- Brian Dungan
- John Rousseau-Parlane
- Paddy Nolan
- Maeve O'Hara
- Chris Stynes
- Kevin Power
- Clare O'Keeffe
- Alex Petcu (director)
To book Bangers and Crash for a festival, venue or school, get in touch. We will put together a programme that suits the space and the audience.
Follow us on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and SoundCloud.