EMPOWER 2026: Let the Music Lead! 

Join us for an inspiring evening of live performances and conversation as EMPOWER: Women Changing Music celebrates the creativity, influence, and diversity of women’s music. This special event brings together engaging chamber performances with thoughtful discussions featuring female leaders from across the music industry. 

EMPOWER is dedicated to advancing fairness and gender equality in the music world by spotlighting female composers and performers and expanding opportunities for emerging artists. Through vibrant live music and insightful dialogue, the initiative champions the transformative impact women are making creatively and professionally, while fostering connection, collaboration, and positive change. 

Highlights include dynamic chamber pieces alongside the premiere of the OpusHER award commission, created to support emerging female composers and expand contemporary repertoire. 

Experience music that matters - be inspired, challenged, and moved by an event that celebrates voices shaping the future of music.

Hosts: Sinéad Walsh and Hannah Seymour 

Performers:

Féinics Quartet - Iulia Florescu, Rohan Harron, Jeannette Bogado, Anna Varga 

Lux Brumalis - Conducted by David Yau

Trio Aurea - Julianne Forrest, Eve Quigley, Georgina Cassidy 

EMPOWER Collective - Sinéad Walsh, Hannah Seymour, Emily Harrison, Eugenia Garcia Cuesta, Hoda Jahanpour 

Panellists:

Jessie Grimes - NCH Discover Artist in Residence 

Hannah Miller - Principal Horn, Irish National Opera

Deborah Kelleher -  Director, Royal Irish Academy of Music

This event is presented in partnership with the Royal Irish Academy of Music, and is supported by RTE ‘Supporting The Arts’