James Joyce loved music. A tenor singer in his youth, Joyce’s writings are filled with musical references and allusions (see Bronze by Gold Heard for more on this). And many musicians are quite fond of James Joyce! Joyce’s ghost is found in nearly every genre of music, from experimental noise and Korean rap to the pillars of classical. Perhaps James Joyce music is actually its own genre, complete with subgenres: Finnegans Wake music; Ulysses music; Dubliners music; Pomes Penyeach music; dirty letters music; and so on.

This bibliography is a work-in-progress; we welcome your additions, submissions, and corrections, so please contact us. You can also read more about Waywords and Meansigns, our project setting Finnegans Wake to music — listen and get involved.

Most references here are self-evident. Whenever possible, we link audio recordings. An old thread from the I Love Music forum provided a couple dozen obscure references, and additional gems were found in a post from the Moïcani – L’Odéonie blog. Sunphone Records has a great website dedicated to both musical influences on Joyce and early adaptations of Joyce’s works. The LiederNet Archive also has a great bibliography of classical music arranges of Joyce. Thanks to John Kearns for suggesting the Contemporary Music Centre database to identify Irish compositions and composers.

1850-1860
The Irish ballad “Finnegan’s Wake” arises in the music-hall tradition of comical Irish songs. Its cyclical story of hod-carrier Tim Finnegan’s fatal, whiskey-prompted fall from a ladder and subsequent resurrection famously provides the basis for Joyce’s novel Finnegans Wake (see 1959, 1962, 1998).

1916
Joyce’s novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man includes a nursery rhyme, seemingly penned by Joyce, and sung by Stephen Dedalus, known as “Brigid’s Song” or simply “Dingdong! The castle bell!”

1924
Joyce wrote alternative lyrics to the traditional Irish song “Molly Brannigan“. “Molly Bloomagain”, as Joyce titled his version, had two major versions: one in 1924 and another in 1935. Erin Hollis has written a paper about the versions, which includes Joyce’s lyrics. (Thanks to Peter Chrisp and the James Joyce Gazette for the info!)

1925
English composer Frank Bridge sets to music Joyce’s poem “Golden Hair“.

1926
Karol Szymanowski, one of Poland’s most celebrated composers, composed Siedem pieśni do słów Jamesa Joyce’a (Seven Songs on Words by James Joyce) for voice and piano. An earlier variant is the first four songs only; songs five through seven were completed by Adam Neuer.

1930
Israel Citkowitz adapts “Strings in the earth and air“, “When the shy star goes forth in heaven“, “O it was out by Donnycarney“, “Bid adieu“, and “My love is in a light attire” as “Five songs from ‘Chamber Music’ by James Joyce” for voice and piano.

1932
Joyce’s poetry book Pomes Penyeach was set to music by in a collection of arrangements published as the Joyce Book, edited by Herbert Hughes. The composers were Ernest Jones Moeran, Arnold Bax, Albert Roussel, Herbert Hughes, John Ireland, Roger Sessions, Arthur Bliss, Herbert Howells, George Antheil, Edgardo Carducci, Eugene Goossens, CW Orr, and Bernard Van Diere. As Joyce remarked: “The best is Molyneux Palmer. After him are [Ernest Jones] Moeran and [Arthur] Bliss.” (Over the course of three decades Irish opera composer Geoffrey Molyneux Palmer set Chamber Music to music, but the majority of his settings were not discovered until the 1980s.) James Joyce Centre has the story. Some of the songs can be found on YouTube; many of the songs can also be found on the Pomes Penyeach album released in 1987 by the Musical Heritage Society. (see also Antheil, 1933)

1935
American composer Samuel Barber sets two of Joyce’s poems, “Of That So Sweet Imprisonment” and “Strings in the Earth and Air“.

Composer Humphrey Searle sought and received permission from Joyce to set to music two of his poems, “Goldenhair” and “I Hear an Army”, although the pieces were long considered lost. David Writght has written about this history, and recorded a realization of the pieces.

1936
Samuel Barber’s “Three Songs, Op. 10” are also poems from Chamber Music. Throughout his career, Barber continued setting Joyce’s words to music. (see 1935, 1937, 1947, 1968, 1971, 1972)

1937
Samuel Barber sets to music Joyce’s poem “In the Dark Pinewood“. (see 1935, 1936, 1947, 1968, 1971, 1972)

1942
Avant-garde composer John Cage wrote “The Wonderful Widow of Eighteen Springs“, which features text from Finnegans Wake. Cage was a big fan of the Wake, continually drawing on the text throughout his career. Luciano Berio and Cathy Berberian would later incorporated Cage’s piece into their repertoire. (see 1979, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1993, 1998, 2001; see Berio and Berberian, 1942, 1953, 1958 and Crystal Castles, 2007)

1944
Pioneering American composer Harry Partch writes his “Two Settings from Joyce’s Finnegans Wake“. (see 1955)

1946
Irish composer Brian Boydell’s Opus 28 is “Five Settings of Poems by James Joyce“.

1947
Samuel Barber’s “Nuvoletta” is adapted from Finnegans Wake. (see 1935, 1936, 1937, 1968, 1971, 1972)

David Leo Diamond composes an arrangement of“Brigid’s Song”, from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. (see Joyce, 1916)

Mátyás Seiber’s cantata Ulysses is based on the questions and answers between Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus in the “Telemachus” episode. (see 1958)

1949
Edmund Pendleton arranges Joyce’s poem “Bid Adieu to Girlish Days“.

1951
Twelve-tone composer Humphrey Searle composes “The Riverrun for Narrator and Orchestra“, based on Finengans Wake. (see 1935)

As part of his “Separate Songs”, celebrated composer Donald Martino set to music Joyce’s poem “All day I hear the noise of waters”. (see 1955)

According to Scott Klein, Joyce’s work was a key influence on String Quartet No. 1 from celebrated American composer Elliott Carter.

1952
Composer Ross Lee Finney writes his Chamber Music suite, setting Joyce’s entire book of poems to music.

1953
Luciano Berio sets three poems from Chamber Music to music, to be performed by his wife Cathy Berberian. (see Berio, 1959, 1961; Berio and Berberian, 1942, 1953, 1958; Crystal Castles, 2007)

1954
Prolific Irish composer Gerard Victory writes “Five Songs of James Joyce”.

1955
Pioneering American composer Harry Partch writes his “Ulysses at the Edge“. (see 1944)

Celebrated composer Donald Martino writes Three Songs, a setting of Joyce’s poems “Alone”, “Tutto e sciolto”, and “A Memory of the Players in a Mirror at Midnight”. (see 1951)

Composer Elizabeth Lauer writes “Seven Songs on Poems from Chamber Music“.

1958
Emerging as a pioneer of electro-music, Italian composer Luciano Berio writes his Thema (Omaggio a Joyce), incorporating Cathy Berberian reading from Ulysses. According to Joyce professor Scott Klein, the piece was derived from a never completed collaboration between Berio and Umberto Eco. (see Berio, 1959, 1961; Berio and Berberian, 1942, 1953, 1958; the Beatles, 1968; Crystal Castles, 2007)

A 1958 photograph of composer Luigi Dallapiccola — who was one of Berio’s teachers — shows the author holding his copy of Ulysses. According to Scott Klein, the composer had a lifelong appreciation of Joyce’s works.

Mátyás Seiber composes “Three Fragments from the Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man“. (see 1947)

David Del Tredici wrote his Four Songs on Texts of James Joyce. In a 2002 interview with Tom Voegeli, Del Tredici explained: “I’ve always been a composer dependent on texts. For a number of years I set James Joyce because I was a lapsed Catholic like Joyce. I was drawn to his tortured life, which fit my musical style at the time, which was dissonant and nearly atonal.” (see 1959, 1964, 1965, 1966)

1959
Trumpeter and fledgling composer Phil Lesh performs his big band arrangement “Finnegan’s Awake” at San Mateo College in Northern California. According to Denis McNally’s A Long Strange Trip another early Lesh composition also refers the Wake, “The Sound of a Man Being Habitacularly Fondseed” (FW 4.31). In 1962 Lesh began studying with Berio at Mills College in Oakland, where he was classmates with a young Steve Reich. In 1964 Jerry Garcia convinced to Lesh to give up trumpet and play bass in Garcia’s rock band. This band later became the Grateful Dead. (see 1968, 1975, 1986, 2005, 2009, 2013; Berio, 1942, 1953, 1958, 1959, 1961)

The Clancy Brothers release a rendition of the traditional Irish ballad Finnegan’s Wake with Tommy Makem on an album of traditional Irish drinking songs. The song becomes a staple for the group. (see 1850-1860, 1962, 1998)

Vincent Persichetti sets to music “Brigid’s Song” from A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. The piece is part of Persichetti’s three James Joyce Songs, which also feature arrangements of “Unquiet heart” and “Noise of Waters”. (see Joyce, 1916)

Irish singer Dominic Behan releases Finnegan’s Wake – The Songs Of James Joyce.

David Del Tredici composes “Two Songs on Poems of James Joyce“, revising the work again in 1978. (see 1958, 1965, 1965, 1966)

Pianist and composer Don Shirley writes the symphonic tone poem Recorso of Finnegans Wake.(Thanks to Sara Jewell for info!)

1960
Although Pierre Boulez never formally set Joyce’s works to music, the composer once referred to Finnegans Wake as “almost a totem”. As Scott Klein highlights, Boulez discussed Joyce’s works on a number of occasions, most notably in the 1960 essay examining his third sonata, entitled,  Sonate, que me veux-tu?

From 1960-1964 Lou Reed studied literature with Delmore Schwartz at Syracuse, and Schwartz remained a lifelong influence on Reed. In 2012, Reed wrote the introduction for one of Schwartz’s posthumuous books: “We gathered around you as you read Finnegans Wake. So hilarious but impenetrable without you. You said there were few things better in life than to devote oneself to Joyce.” For more information, check out this post from Peter Chrisp.

1961
Luciano Berio completes his work Epifanie, for mezzosoprano and orchestra. The piece includes text from Ulysses and A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Berio revised the work again in 1965. Berio described Epifanie as “a cycle of orchestral pieces into which a cycle of vocals pieces has been interpolated. The two ‘cycles’ can be combined together in various ways; they can also be performed separately… The significant connection between the vocals pieces can thus appear in different lights according to their position in the instrumental development.” In 1961 Berio also remixes his 1959 work Thema (Omaggio a Joyce) in his a new piece, called Visage. (see Berio, 1942, 1953, 1958, 1959, 1961; Crystal Castles, 2007)

1962
Irish folk band The Dubliners is founded in Dublin, named after Joyce’s short-story collection. In 1966, The Dubliners record a live album titled Finnegan Wakes, featuring one of the best-known renditions of the ballad “Finnegan’s Wake“. (see 1850-1860, 1959, 1998)

1963
Allan Sherman’s song “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh! (A Letter from Camp)“, released as a single and then included on the album My Son, the Nut, includes the lyric “the head coach wants no sissies/ So he reads to us from something called Ulysses“. (Thanks to Jonathan Goldman for this!)

Inspired by Joyce, Polish composer Tadeusz Baird writes Epiphany Music.

1964
David Del Tredici’s arranges Joyce’s poem “I Hear An Army” for soprano and string quartet. (see 1958, 1959, 1965, 1966)

After reviewers compared his book In His Own Write to the works of Joyce, John Lennon became interested in the author, buying a copy of the Wake and subscribing to the James Joyce Quarterly. Discovering the works of Joyce, Lennon is quoted by biographer Tim Riley as saying, “was like finding Daddy.” (see the Beatles, 1967, 1968; Lennon, 2000)

1965
David Del Tredici’s “Night Conjure-Verse” is a song cycle based on two poems from Pomes Penyeach. (see 1958, 1959, 1965, 1966)

Elliot Kaplan composes the score for Mary Manning and Mary Ellen Bute’s film Passages from James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake.

Alfred Reed composed a clarinet rhapsody entitled “Rahoon (After James Joyce)” inspired by Joyce’s poem “She Weeps Over Rahoon.” Was

1966
Prior to becoming a songwriter, Leonard Cohen was a novelist. His second novel, Beautiful Losers, was decreed Joycean by the Boston Sunday Herald: “James Joyce is not dead. He lives in Montréal under the name of Leonard Cohen.” This quote was subsequently used to promote Cohen’s 1967 debut album, Songs of Leonard Cohen. (see 1986)

Choreographer Jean Erdman’s The Coach with the Six Insides is a musical play based on Finnegans Wake, with music by Teiji Ito.

André Hodeir releases Anna Livia Plurabelle, a jazz cantata based on Finnegans Wake. (see 1972)

David Del Tredici sets two of Joyce’s Penyach poems as “Syzygy, Two Songs for Two Groups“.(see 1958, 1959, 1964, 1965)

1967
After Bathing at Baxter’s, the album by psychedelic San Francisco band Jefferson Airplane, includes a song about Leopold and Molly Bloom entitled “Rejoyce“.

Although there are varying accounts on the exact information, James Joyce was considered for inclusion on the cover of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. (see 1968; Lennon, 1964, 2000)

1968
“Solitary Hotel” in Samuel Barber’s song cycle Despite and Still includes text from Ulysses. (see 1935, 1936, 1937, 1947, 1971, 1972)

According to David Shenk and Steve Silberman in their Skeleton Key: A Dictionary for Deadheads, while the Grateful Dead were recording their album Anthem of the Sun, “instead of the ‘one, two, three’ that kicks off most recording sessions, Robert Hunter would recite sections of James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake by heart”. As Robert Hunter, the Dead’s primary lyricist, explained to Steve Silberman in a 1992 interview: “Before I was writing songs, I was a stoned James Joyce head, Finnegans Wake head. I can still recite the first page and last couple of pages of that thing. There was something in the way those words socketed together, and the wonderful feel of reciting them, that very, very deeply influenced me.” (see 1959, 1968, 1975, 1986, 2005, 2009, 2013)

The Producers, a film and subsequent musical by Mel Brooks, stars Gene Wilder as Leo Bloom. Bloom’s co-star is Max Bialystock, played by Zero Mostel. In the film, the two characters first met each other on June 16, which is the date Ulysses also takes places (and the day is now celebrated as Bloomsday).

Missa Sur L’Homme Armé by Peter Maxwell Davies was inspired, according to Scott Klein, by the “Cyclops” episode in Ulysses.

Side A of the Firesign Theatre’s How Can You Be in Two Places at Once When You’re Not Anywhere at All concludes with a recitation of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy from Ulysses.

Fred Lerdahl composes his piece “Wake” based on Joyce’s book. In his program note, Lerdahl writes, “The main action of the piece resides in the cycles, which rise to parallel climaxes and which are meant to reflect the novel’s themes of recurrence and metamorphosis.”

According to Scott Klein, Paul McCartney was inspired to write the Beatles’ “Revolution #9” after attending a 1966 lecture on Luciano Berio’s Thema (Omaggio a Joyce). (see Berio, 1958; the Beatles, 1967; Lennon, 1964, 2000)

1969
Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s Requiem für einen jungen Dichter (Requiem for a Young Poet) includes text from Molly Bloom’s soliloquy.

Irish composer Bernadette Marmion writes “Music Sweet“, a setting of five poems from Joyce’s Chamber Music.

Dr. Strangely Strange’s album Kip of the Serenes includes a setting of Joyce’s poem “Strings in the Earth and Air“. (see Robin Williamson, 1972)

1970
Syd Barrett of Pink Floyd releases his solo album The Madcap Laughs. The album features “Golden Hair“, a poem by Joyce from Pomes Penyeach, set to music by Barrett. (see Slow Dive, 1991; Alice, 2003)

1971
Samuel Barber’s “Fadograph of a Yestern Scene” features text from Finnegans Wake. (see 1935, 1936, 1937, 1947, 1968, 1972)

British composer John Buller composes “Two Night Pieces from Finnegans Wake“. In The Guardian‘s  2004 obituary for Buller, Martin Wainwright wrote, “John’s discovery of Joyce fuelled him for most of his creative life, and I think what became fundamental to everything he composed was the Joycean notion that imagination is nothing but extended memory, that the commonplace of our musical or aural consciousness is virtually infinite, so that the task of the composer is to go down to the elements of musical consciousness and reorder them.” (see 1972, 1978, 1988)

1973
The song “Not Faking It” by Scottish hard rock band Nazareth includes the lyric “James Joyce was a mudslinger / Jesus Christ was a forgiver / me, I’m just a rock’n’roll singer”.

1974
Composer Joel Thome’s Time Spans includes text from the Wake. Time Spans also incorporates radio signal from outer space, and is said to be the first piece of music to do this. In his music classes at SUNY–Purchase, Thome encourages students to read Finnegans Wake to heighten creativity. (Thanks to Will Prinz for info.)

1975
Electro-music composer Ned Lagin worked with an all-star cast of rock ‘n’ rollers to create an experimental music piece entitled Seastones, which includes spoken passages allegedly influenced by Finnegans Wake. Featuring David Crosby; Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead; and Grace Slick, David Freiberg and Spencer Dryden of Jefferson Airplane. Lagin also performed “Seastones” on-stage with the Grateful Dead numerous times in 1974. (see 1959, 1968, 1986, 2005, 2009, 2013)

1976
Describing the composition of the Sex Pistols punk rock classic “Anarchy in the UK”, in 2018 John Lydon aka Johnny Rotten said, the song was written “almost spontaneously … [with] what Robin Williams described as ‘overflowing madness’ … Mix that with a bit of James Joyce and out it comes. Repression, [anti-Irish] racism, the belief that class was all important … I’d seen what was coming: Ikea-made shopping centres, the destruction of personality. I was lucky to have words to express what a lot of people were feeling.”

Titled after a quote from Book I, chapter 8 of Finnegans Wake, a piano composition by Benjamin Boretz “…My chart shines high where the blue milk’s upset,” was released. The score for the piece was published as a single staff across 85 pages of Volume 14 of “Perspectives of New Music” in 1976. Thanks to Neal Kosaly-Meyer for information on this.

1977
Composer Roger Marsh’s Not a soul but ourselves… includes text from Finnegans Wake. In recent years, Walsh has overseen the James Joyce audio books produced by Naxo.

Stephen Albert composes his piece To Wake the Dead: Six Sentimental Songs and an Interlude after ‘Finnegans Wake’. Albert, a highly celebrated composer, drew inspiration from Joyce throughout his career. (see 1983, 1985, 1988, 1989, 1992)

1978
Canadian punk band Nomeansno forms, originally consisting of brothers Rob and John Wright. Rob Wright is reportedly a huge fan of Joyce and at least one of the band’s album covers is said to contain a Finnegans Wake quote. (If you know which album has the quote, please get in touch!)

Composer Robert Erickson’s piece “Quoq” takes its name from the Wake.

John Buller composes The Mime of Mick, Nick & the Maggies, a celebrated piece of new music based on Part II of the Wake. (see 1971, 1972, 1988)

1979
John Cage writes perhaps the most famous musical setting of Finnegans Wake. Roaratorio, an Irish circus on Finnegans Wake  premieres on Klaus Schöning radio programme for West German Radio. Modern dance choreographer Merce Cunningham, a longtime collaborator with John Cage, created a dance piece for Roaratorio in 1983. [thanks to Hugo Truyens for more info; Brazen Head had the story but site is now defunct] (see 1942, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1993, 1998, 2001)

1980
Toru Takemitsu, the great 20th century Japanese composer, composes Far calls. Coming, far! for violin and orchestra. The piece takes its title from the closing passage of Finnegans Wake. (see 1981, 1984, 2009)

Composer Bernard Rands writes “Canti Lunatici” for soprano and chamber ensemble. The piece uses texts, including Joyce, about the moon.

Inspired by Joyce, Tomasz Sikorski composes “Struny w ziemi” (String in the Earth), for 15 strings.

Serge Gainsbourg read something from Joyce in an episode of the French television show “Ah vous, écrivez?” (Thanks to Nigel Bryant for this!) (see 1984)

Jazz trumpeter Kenny Wheeler’s album Around 6 includes the song “Riverrun“, a reference to Finnegans Wake.

Composer and inventor Tod Machover’s “Soft morning, City!” is based on text from Finnegans Wake.

Irish composer Walter Beckett writes a song cycle based on Joyce’s poems entitled “Goldenhair“.

Discussing the Police’s 1980 song “De Do Do Do De, De Da Da Da“, Sting said, “Almost eveck yone who reviewed it said, Oh, this is baby talk. They were just listening to the chorus alone, obviously. But they’re the same people who would probably never get through the first paragraph of Finnegan’s Wake, because that’s ‘baby talk’, too.” (see Stewart Copeland, 2013)

1981
Taking his title from the Wake‘s closing passage, Toru Takemitsu composes A Way a Lone for string quartet. The piece is later arranged for orchestra, A Way A Lone II. (see 1980, 1984, 2009)

Irish composer Douglas Gunn writes “A Joyce Collection of Ayres” based on Joyce’s poems.

Polish composer Paweł Szymański writes Villanelle, for alto tenor, 2 violas and harpsichord, to the words by James Joyce.

Polish musician Jan Castor’s song “Welladay” takes its lyrics from Joyce.

1982
“My House“, a song on Lou Reed’s album The Blue Mask, includes the lyric “My Dedalus to your Bloom, was such a perfect wit/ and to find you in my house makes things perfect”.

The British rock band Baby Tuckoo is formed, talking their name from a line in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

Roger Reynolds’s experimental electronic piece “Voicespace III: Eclipse” includes text from Joyce.

Author Anthony Burgess wrote a radio play for the BBC based on Ulysses, entitled Blooms of Dublin.

John Cage’s radioplay “James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, Erik Satie: An Alphabet” premieres on WDR Cologne. (see 1942, 1979, 1984, 1985, 1993, 1998, 2001)

Irish singer-bard Van Morrison’s song “Summertime in England” references James Joyce. (see 1993)

1984
One of his “Waterscape” pieces, Toru Takemitsu composes riverrun, borrowing the title from the Wake‘s opening. (see 1980, 1981, 2009)

Southern California hardcore punk group Minutemen release their magnum opus, Double Nickels on the Dime. Minutemen bassist Mike Watt has emphasized over the years how the album was influenced by “Jim Joyce” in numerous ways, most obviously on the song “June 16th.” (see 1991, 1997, 2008, 2017)

John Cage composes “Nowth upon Nacht“, based on text from Finnegans Wake and in memoriam for singer Cathy Berberian. (see 1942, 1979, 1982, 1985, 1993, 1998, 2001; Berberian, 1942, 1953, 1958)

Serge Gainsbourg’s “I’m the Boy” is built around a refrain that occurs in Joyce — the lyrics “I AM THE BOY/ THAT CAN ENJOY/ INVISIBILITY” appear in Ulysses, as Stephen Dedalus recalls a song from the musical Turko the Terrible. (Thanks to Nigel Bryant for this!) (see 1980; Sonic Youth, 1984)

“Water Torture“, included on Scraping Foetus Off the Wheel’s album Hole, includes a reference to Ulysses.

1985
John Cage’s solo organ piece ASLSP takes its title from the Wake. Written on the score of the piece: “The title is an abbreviation of ‘as slow as possible.’ It also refers to ‘Soft morning, city! Lsp!’ the first exclamations in the last paragraph of Finnegans Wake (James Joyce).” By deduction Cage’s 1987 adaptation of ASLSP — a 24-hour piece entitled Organ²/ASLSP (As SLow aS Possible) — also takes its name from the Wake. (see 1942, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1993, 1998, 2001)

Stephen Albert composes “Flower of the Mountain“, an adaptation of Molly Bloom’s soliloquy from Ulysses. (see 1977, 1983, 1988, 1989, 1992)

Richard Emsley composes “…from swerve of shore to bend of bay…“, a title taken from the opening of Finnegans Wake.

Ryszard Szeremeta composes his “James Joyce Variations”.

British post-punk band The Wake released their album Here Comes Everybody.

Game Theory’s album Real Nighttime opens with a brief introductory track entitled “Here Comes Everybody“, a Finnegans Wake reference.

Current 93 and Sickness of Snakes release a 12″ split with a quote from Finnegans Wake written on the album’s spine: “Brékkek Kékkek Kékkek Kékkek! Kóax Kóax Kóax! Ualu Ualu Ualu! Quaouauh!” Current 93’s song “Killy Kill Killy (A Fire Sermon)” is dedicated to James Joyce.

1986
Jerry Garcia and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead join mythologist Joseph Campbell and Jungian analyst John Weir Perry for “Ritual and Rapture, From Dionysus to the Grateful Dead”, a day of discussion and music at San Francisco’s Palace of the Fine Arts. When asked about his meeting with Campbell in a 1987 interview, Garcia explained: “I was a Joseph Campbell fan back in the early ’60s when I read theSkeleton Key to Finnegans Wake. Which I was fascinated by, and Finnegans Wake — I was fascinated by James Joyce in the early ’60s.”(see 1959, 1968, 1975, 2005, 2009, 2013)

“Secret Girls” on Sonic Youth’s EVOL album has an apparent Ulysses reference with the lyric “My mother used to say/ You’re the boy that can enjoy invisibility.” The lyrics “I AM THE BOY/ THAT CAN ENJOY/ INVISIBILITY” appear in Ulysses, as Stephen Dedalus recalls a song from the musical Turko the Terrible;  the lyrics also appear two years earlier in Serge Gainsbourg’s “I’m the Boy”. (see Text of Light, 2008; Serge Gainsbourg, 1984)

Asked about James Joyce’s influence on his songwriting, Leonard Cohen explains that a select few passages from Joyce had great impact on him: “‘The Dead.’ That paragraph. It’s not the work of an author, but maybe five lines. It’s those five lines that will get me reluctantly to explore the rest of the guy’s work. But that paragraph I’ve never forgotten. There’s that paragraph “Snow was general all over Ireland.” It described the snow. It’s Montréal. It’s our snow, our black iron gates in Montréal. It was perfect and the other one was – I believe it was from the Portrait. He sees this women with seaweed on her thigh. That passage, and snow general all over Ireland, and David seeing Bathsheba on the roof. There are three or four scenes like that that destroyed my life. I couldn’t escape those visions. Now I feel I’m overthrowing them. (see 1966)

Hans Zender premieres his Joyce-inspired opera Stephen Climax.

1987
Current 93’s album Swastikas for Goddy includes a quote from from Joyce in the liner notes: “When all vegetation is covered by the flood there are now eyebrows on the face of the Waterworld.” (This quote is inaccurately attributed to Finnegans Wake; we believe it comes from one of Joyce’s letters to Harriet Shaw Weaver.)

1988
The band Nation of Ulysses forms in the Washington D.C. post-punk scene.

The North American version of The Pogues’ If I Should Fall from Grace with God includes a picture of James Joyce on the album cover. (see Fearnley, 2012)

1989
Eclectic pop musician Kate Bush requested permission from the James Joyce Estate to use Molly Bloom’s soliloquy (the final passage in Ulysses) on the title track of Bush’s album The Sensual World. Her request was finally approved, in 2011.

1991
Bassist Mike Watt’s band fIREHOSE releases the song “Up Finnegan’s Ladder” on their album Flying the Flannel. (see 1984, 1997, 2008, 2017)

Derelicts of Dialect, the second album from the hip hop group 3rd Bass, features the song “Portrait of the Artist as a Hood“.

Dream pop / shoegaze band Slow Dive perform a cover of Syd Barrett’s “Golden Hair” during their Peel Session. Another version of the song was included on the 2005 re-issue of their 1991 album Just For A Day. (see Barrett, 1970; Alice, 2003)

The lyrics of “Endless Art“, a song on A House’s EP Bingo, are a list of famous artists who have died. This list includes James Joyce.

Musical group Everything But the Girl’s song “Gabriel” features refrain “the longest way round is the shortest way home,” a line from Ulysses.

1992
Nicholas Hopkins composes “Joyce Transcription I” for piano: “what I want to achieve most of all in this work is the multiplicity of sense that Joyce so astutely developed in his final book”. (see 1994)

1993
Punk rocker Joey Ramone recorded a rendition of “The Wonderful Widow of Eighteen Springs“, a piece written by John Cage in 1942. Joey’s recording was included on Caged/Uncaged—A Rock/Experimental Homage to John Cage, an album that also featured David Byrne, Lou Reed, and Debbie Harry. (see 1942, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1998, 2001)

John Wolf Brennan’s Text, Context, Co-Text & Co-Co-Text for solo piano is inspired by Finnegans Wake and to a lesser extent, Ulysses. (see 1994, 2005)

Finnegans Break, the Times album featuring Tippa Irie, is a seemingly reference to Joyce.

Musique concrète pioneer Otto Luening composes his Joyce Cycle, based on Joyce’s poems. Luening was a friend of Joyce in Zurich, where they worked together on Joyce’s theatre company the English Players.

Alfred Crumlish created chance structure “instructions for composing songs derived from Finnegans Wake by James Joyce” entitled “26 Songs from Finnegans Wake“.

A rare live performance of Dream Theater’s song “Eve” included audio samples from A Portrait of the Against as a Young Man.

Van Morrison’s song “Too Long in Exile” mentions James Joyce. (see 1982)

The Hell’s Kitchen Opera Company produced an opera based on one of Joyce’s short stories entitled “The Dead: a one-act opera”. Directed by Linda Lehr, with music by Murray Boren and libretto by Glen Nelson.

Belgium musicians Jean-Louis Aucremanne, Alain Lemaître, Richard Redcrossed, Henry Krutzen name their new prog band Finnegans Wake.

Irish jazz guitarist Louis Stewart releases his Joyce-inspired album Joycenotes.

1994
Nicholas Hopkins re-works his 1992 piece “Joyce Transcription I” as “Double on Joyce Transcription I” for piano with modified tape: “Double on Joyce Transcription I is the sixth in a projected cycle of pieces that act as musical commentaries on James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake. Each piece in the cycle is based on one of the seventeen chapters of the book, and in each I attempt to transcribe Joyce’s literary operations into musical ones.”

John Wolf Brennan’s Epithalamium for chamber ensemble is inspired by James joyce’s poems, Chamber Music. (see 1993, 2005)

Martyn Bates set Chamber Music to music, released in two volumes. The first volume appeared in 1996 on the Sub Rosa record label. (see 1996, 2017)

David Bowie acquires Le Brocquy’s painting of James Joyce for his personal art collection.

1995
Irish composer Frank Corcoran writes “Joycespeak-Musik“, an electro-acoustic piece for tape. In an article published by the CMC, Axel Klein recalls another piece by Corcoran called Aportraitoftheartistasayoungmanwhowantedtosingbutwroteinstead. (see 2015)

1996
Martyn Bates set Chamber Music to music, released in two volumes. The second volume appeared in 1996 on the Sub Rosa record label. (see 1994, 2017)

Creating an album from texts of Finnegans Wake, Phil Minton releases his Mouthfull of Ecstasy. (see 2017; also Vladimir Estragon, 1989)

New Zealand free improv trio Sandoz Lab Technican’s album “Unhemmed As It Is Uneven” takes its title from a line in Finnegans Wake. (see Tim Cornelius, 2017)

The Kevin Norton Trio’s album Integrated Variables, with Mark Dresser and George Cartwright, includes the song “Flow to Riverrun”.

Composer Michael Hynes’s “The softest mourning” is based on the closing lines of Finnegans Wake. (see 1997)

Indiana band emiLy releases their album riverrun. The original album art design featured text from the Wake and the title track begins with the melody of “Finnegan’s Wake”. The track “Talking God, Talking Girls” includes a recording of Joyce reading from the Wake.

1997
Mike Watt releases his first solo album, a punk rock opera entitled Contemplating the Engine Room. Describing the daily life of his father, Watt reports that his album takes structural and content cue from the Odyssey and Ulysses. (see 1984, 1991, 2008, 2017)

After the Joyce estate denied Mathew Rosenblum permission to use text from Finnegans Wake, Roger Zahab wrote a parody of the Wake for use in Rosenblum’s piece “Maggies“.

Composer Michael Hynes’s “4four” is said to be based on the Mamalujo motif found in Finnegans Wake. (Reference: Moïcani – L’Odéonie blog post.) (see 1996)

1998
Dropkick Murphys, the pride of Boston, record a version of the traditional ballad “Finnegan’s Wake“. (see 1850-1850, 1959, 1962)

The New Millennium Ensemble release their album “H.C.E – Here Comes Everybody“, borrowing the titled from Finnegans Wake. The album includes a piece by noted Wake reader John Cage. (Cage, see 1942, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1993, 2001)

The title of Romanian spectral composer Ana-Maria Avram’s “Chaosmos” is a reference to Finnegans Wake.

Australian anonymous band This Is Serious Mum (TISM) reference Joyce in the opening lines of “Whatareya?“: “You’re a yob or you’re a wanker, take your fucking choice / who is your favorite genius, James Hird or James Joyce?”

Spanish post-rock band Migala releases a single Finnegans Late.

1999
James Joyce’s The Dead, a musical by Richard Nelson and Shaun Davey, based on Joyce’s short story “The Dead”. Premiered on Broadway in 2000, winning a Tony for “Best Book of a Musical”. (see Davey, 2015)

Andreas Vollenweider’s “Your Silver Key” on the album Cosmopoly features Carly Simon singing text from Finnegans Wake. (Simon, see 1989)

Alfred Heller arranges Joyce’s Chaiber Music as part of his album Great Poets in Song with Marc Heller.

2000
Celtic punk band Black 47 released “I Got Laid on James Joyce’s Grave“, on their album Trouble in the Land.

Talib Kweli and Hi-Tek’s hip hop duo Reflection Eternal reference James Joyce on their Train of Thought album. The song “Memories Live” includes the lyric “it kinda make me think of way back when/ I was the portrait of the artist as a young man”.

Composer Timothy Sullivan’s A Soft and Golden Fire includes arrangements of Joyce’s poems.

The Florida indie band PopCanon, fronted by M. David Hornbuckle, record their song “Bloomsday“. (see M. David Hornbuckle, 2017)

Joe Pytka directed a posthumous music video for John Lennon’s “(Just Like) Starting Over“. The video is framed as a scrapbook of Lennon’s life, and features a copy of Finnegans Wake. (Some sources claim that Lennon directed the video before his death in 1980; this was not the case.) (see Lennon, 1964, the Beatles, 1967, 1968)

2001
Amber’s song “Yes!” was number one on the US Dance charts. The song was based on Molly Bloom’s soliloquy in Ulysses and the lead single to Amber’s 2002 album Naked.

John Cage’s “James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, Erik Satie: An Alphabet” is adapted for stage by Laura Kuhn, with Cage’s original sound score being developed by Mikel Rouse. (see Cage, 1942, 1979, 1982, 1984, 1985, 1993, 1998)

Athenaeum’s eponymous album was originally entitled Plurabelle, a seeming reference to Finnegans Wake.

Ted Leo and The Pharmacists song “M¥ Vien iLin“, on their album The Tyranny of Distance, includes two verses referencing Joyce: “We make our days as they make us/ As I must as Odysseus/ Make myself my own Telemachus/ ‘Bous Stephanos, Stephanoumenos Dedalus!'” followed by “And if it hasn’t been a bust/ Then land-ho, Ulysseus/ And all of us like Dedalus/ Dead, dead all of us”.

2002
The band Two Gallants forms, taking their name from the short story in Dubliners.

2003
Sean Walsh’s film Bloom featured soundtrack written and produced by David Kahne. Kahne is a noted record producer and composer, as well as Joyce enthusiast. (see 2016)

On her album Viaggio In Italia, Italian artist Alice covered Syd Barrett’s version of “Golden Hair“. (see Barret, 1970; Slow Dive, 1991)

W.A.C.O. aka Wild Acoustic Chamber Orchestra releases Finnegan’s W.A.C.O. (see Steve Gregoropoulos, 2016, 2017)

2004
DJ Spooky aka Paul D. Miller’s book Rhythm Science references Joyce a couple times. The book’s accompanying CD includes a remix track of Joyce reading from the Wake, “Oval vs Yoshihiro Hanno April Remix mixed w/ James Joyce Anna Livia Plurabelle (Finnegans Wake)“. (see 2008)

In the first volume of his autobiography, Chronicles: Volume One, Bob Dylan described a conversation with Archie MacLeish, with reference to James Joyce: “Goddard Lieberson, president of Columbia Records, had given me [Ulysses] as a gift, a first-edition copy of the book and I couldn’t make hide nor hair of it. James Joyce seemed like the most arrogant man who ever lived, had both his eyes wide open and great faculty of speech, but what he say, I knew not what. I wanted to ask MacLeish to explain James Joyce to me, to make sense of something that seemed so out of control, and I knew that he would have, but I didn’t” (p. 130). (Goddard Lieberson reportedly composed choral arrangements of Joyce’s text, but little information is available on this — if anyone has more info, please let us know.) (see 2009)

The album Speak from art pop duo No-Man includes the song “Riverrun“, a reference to the Wake.

According to an interview with the Contemporary Music Centre, Irish composer Michael Holohan’s “The Snotgreen C for flute” is “based on the first chapter of Ulysses… [the] piece was composed for the Centenary of James Joyce. The premiere was given in the Joyce Tower, Sandycove on Bloomsday 2004″.

French composer Armand Amar soundtrack for the film La terre vue du ciel includes the song “Chaosmos“, a reference to Finnegans Wake.

Composer James Yannatos releases Symphonies Sacred & Secular: Strings in the Earth and Air, a seeming reference to Joyce’s poem “Strings in the Earth and Air“.

Ben Watson dedicates his Resonance FM show “Late Lunch With Out To Lunch” to juxtaposing recordings of Frank Zappa’s guitar solo with readings from Finnegans Wake. (Ben Watson also mentions Finnegans Wake in his book The Complete Guide to the Music of Frank Zappa.)

In an interview, musician Trey Gunn remarked, “I don’t know exactly how [Joyce] influenced me, but I’ve found it some of the most striking things I’ve encountered.”

Russian poet and translator Anri Volokhonsky collaborated with musicians Leonid Fedorov and Vladimir Volkov on two albums Joyce material. The first album, Joyce, features Anri Volokhonsky reading what he called a Russian “arrangement” (translation) of Finnegans Wake. The second album, Mountains and Rivers, features Volokhonsky’s poems inspired by Joyce; for this album Fedorov and Volkov are joined by Dimitri Ozerski. Fedorov, Volkov, and Ozerski are members of the Russian band Auktyon (АукцЫон) and the album was released on Fedorov’s label, Ulitka Records. (Big thanks to Roman Tsivkin for information on this!)

2005
When asked by Chicago Tribune reporter Nina Metz, “What reading material would we find in your bathroom?”, former Grateful Dead bassist simply answers “Finnegans Wake by James Joyce”. (see 1959, 1968, 1975, 1986, 2009, 2013)

The Medicine Show Theatre Ensemble performs a musical adaptation of Finnegans Wake.

John Wolf Brennan’s song “Looking for Mr Ulysses” is released on his album I.N.I.T.I.A.L.S. – Sources along the Songlines 1979-91. (see 1993, 1994)

Beck’s song “Qué Onda Guero” on his album Guero features a man unexpectedly saying “James Joyce” and then shouting “Michael Bolton”.

John Ellis’s album One Foot In The Swamp includes the songs “Work in Progress” and “Michael Finnegan”, which may be references to the Wake?

South Korean hip hop duo Epik High reference James Joyce and Finnegans Wake in their “Follow the Flow“, a song featuring MYK and D-Tox.

2006
The song “Finnegans Wake” by singer-songwriter Barry Bender uses the book as a metaphor for the confusion that is love. (see 2017)

Pinetop Seven’s song “Fadograph of a Yestern Scene” is a reference to the Wake.

Sacramento jazz band Kairos Quartet release their album riverrun. The band subsequently changed their name to riverrun.

Jazz singer Susanne Abbuehl’s album Compass includes three arrangements of Joyce’s poems — “The Twilight Turns from Amethyst“, “Bright Cap And Streamers“, and “In the Dark Pine-Wood” — and “Sea, Sea!“, a song with text from Finnegans Wake.

2007
Electronic band Crystal Castles released “Air War“, which features sampling from Luciano Berio and Cathy Berberian’s adaptation of Ulysses. (see Berio, 1959, 1961; Berio and Berberian, 1942, 1953, 1958)

Danish composer Hans Henrik Nordstrøm’s piece Finnegan’s has two parts: “Riverfun” and “Livifleksion“.

2008
UK label Fire Records released a compilation album of various musicians performing the poems of Chamber Music. The album includes Monica Queen, War Against Sleep, Ed Harcourt, Jessica Bailiff, Venture Lift, Virgin Passages, Htrk, Califone, Mike Watt, Owen Tromans, Airport Studies, Text of Light, Mary Lorson, Willy Mason, Noahjohn, Ian Kearey, Abigail Hopkins and David Hurn, Coldharbourstores, The Minus 5, Lori Scacco, The Great Depression, Puerto Muerto, Mercury Rev, Flying Saucer Attack, Sweet Trip, Little Sparta and Gerry Mitchell, Sphyr, Mountain Men Anonymous, Tenebrous Liar, Green Pajamas, Gravenhurst, Christian Kiefer, Duke Garwood, The Lovetones, and Kinski. Jim O’Rourke, Jeff Tweedy of Wilco, Wayne Kramer, Bark Psychosis, and the Silent League were all rumored to be involved in earlier stages. (Monica Queen, see Tenement & Temple, 2017; Mary Lorson, see 2015; Mercury Rev, see Old Fiends, 2017; Text of Light, see Sonic Youth, 1986, and Ulrich Krieger, 2017; Tweedy/Wilco, see 2001; Watt, see 1984, 1991, 1997; many artists also involved in Waywords and Meansigns, see 2017)

DJ Spooky aka Paul D. Miller’s book Sound Unbound refers Joyce in passing, and the book’s accompanying CD features a remix track of Erik Satie and James Joyce reading the Aeolus speech from Ulysses: “James Joyce/Erik Satie, ‘Eolian Episode/Gnossiene (DJ Spooky Dub Version)’“. (see 2004)

secretSpeech, an experimental electronic band from Luxembourg, release their album winnegan’s fake; the album’s song titles are words found in the Wake.

The song “Helpless Corpses Enactment“, on metal band Sleepytime Gorilla Museum’s album In Glorious Times, is written entirely with lyrics from Finnegans Wake.

2009
I’m listening to Billy Joe Shaver/And I’m reading James Joyce/Some people tell me I got the blood of the land in my voice. A lyric from Bob Dylan’s song “I Feel A Change Comin’ On”, featured on the album Together Through Life. The entire album was co-written with former Grateful Dead lyricist and noted Joycean Robert Hunter. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Bob Dylan explained how he first heard Billy Joe Shaver’s song through Waylon Jennings. “Waylon played me ‘Ain’t No God in Mexico,’ and I don’t know, it was quite good… Shaver and David Allen Coe became my favorite guys in that [outlaw country] genre. The verse came out of nowhere. No … you know something? Subliminally, I can’t say that this is actually true. But I think it was more of a Celtic thing. Tying Billy Joe with James Joyce. I think subliminally or astrologically those two names just wanted to be combined. Those two personalities.” (see 2004)

Handsomeboy Technique, the DJ moniker of Yoshitaka Morino, releases his album Terrestrial Tone Cluster, containing the song “Guiding Lights (Far Calls, Coming, Far)“. The phrase “Far calls. Coming, far!” appears in the closing passage of the Wake, although Morino could have encountered the title by way of Toru Takemitsu’s 1980 piece. (If anyone has information on how to contact Yoshitaka Morino, please let us know.)

French experimental musician Rotkappchen records a song “Finnegans Wake“.

Electronic musician Scanner’s album Rockets Unto The Edges of Edges includes the song “Anna Livia Plurabelle”.

2010
Ambient artist Robert Haigh’s album Anonymous Lights includes the song “Along the Riverrun“.

Indie pop band Trevor Sensitive and the Locals include the song “I’ve read Finnegans Wake” on their album Sensitive.

Lithuanian band Elektrik Sketches release their song “Chaosmos“, a reference to Finnegans Wake.

Noise band Eigenstate’s album In Blotch and Void includes the songs “A Way A Lone A Last A Loved A Long” and “His Mouthful Of Ecstasy”.

Boston Spaceships borrow a phrase from Joyce for the title of their album Our Cubehouse Still Rocks.

Crossover Prog musician Sand Snowman’s song “Riverrun” is reference to Finnegans Wake.

British musician Daniel Land begins a series of recordings called “riverrun“, which he describes as ” heavily-composted landscape recordings”.

2011
Chris Rael’s song cycle “Araby” retells the stories of Dubliners. Produced twice Off-Broadway, “Araby” won the New York International Fringe Festival’s Excellence in Music Composition Award in 2011. Some of the performances are available online here; the original demos for the song cycle can be heard here. (see 2017)

Early electronic music pioneers Tangerine Dream release an album entitled Finnegans Wake.

William Averitt composes “From Dreams” for choir with piano and viola. The piece has three movements, each incorporating text from Joyce’s poems: “Gentle lady, do not sing Sad songs”; “Sleep now, O sleep now”; and “O cool is the valley”.

Estonian computer game designer and musician Andrei Zavidei arranges a version of Joyce’s “Ecce Puer“.

The Bermuda Triangle’s Different Strokes for Different Folks includes an instrumental dance track “Finnegans Wake (Extended Mix)“.

Polish minimalist composer Benicewicz’s song “riverrun” is a reference to Finnegans Wake.

Michael Heumann releases riverrun, a concept album about battling netherworld zombies.

Citing James Joyce as one of his favorite authors, Car Seat Head Rest references Joyce in his song “The Drum“.

2012
Composer Robert Paterson’s A New Eaarth warns about the dangers of climate change with relying on “poems and quotes from around the world, including texts by Wendell Barry, James Joyce, Percy Bysshe Shelly and William Wordsworth. The text and poems allude to the four ancient, classical elements—earth, air, fire and water.”

“The King of Ithaca“, the final track on Chris Lewis’s album Paradise and Vu Du is an homage to James Joyce.

James Fearnley of the Pogues references the Wake in the title of his memoir, Here Comes Everybody: The Story of the Pogues. (Thanks to Peter Chrisp on this!)(see the Pogues, 1988)

Wakean printmaker and artist Nicci Haynes creates sound piece “James Joyce reading from Finnegans Wake read by James Joyce, arranged for 20-note paper strip musical movement“. (see 2016)

Lyricist Indi Riverflow penned “Riverrun“, a song about the Wake, for John Kadlecik. Kadlecik is best known as a Grateful Dead-styled guitarist, playing in Dark Star Orchestra and Furthur. Riverflow also wrote a song “Here Comes Everybody“. (Grateful Dead, see 1959, 1968, 1975, 1986, 2005, 2009)

Folk metal band Kernunna’s album “The Seim Anew” is a reference to the Wake and includes the songs “The Seim Anew”, “The Keys to. Given!” and “Ricorso”.

The band Zijnzijn Zijnzijn! takes their name from Finnegans Wake; the cover on their Demos album is a reproduced page of the Wake. Their album Wordwounder also takes its titles from the Wake.

The Australian band Cats of Copenhagen include the song “Riverrun” on their Wheatgrass EP.

Los Angeles powerpop band Sanglorians release their debut album Initiation. The band name is a reference to Finnegans Wake.

2015
Waywords and Meansigns releases the First Edition, setting Finnegans Wake to music unabridged. Each chapter is recorded by a separate artist or group. Contributors mentioned elsewhere in this bibliography include Hayden Chisholm and Peter Quadrino.

The title track on composer Wiel Conen and singer Charlotte Gilissen’s album Charlotte’s Drone includes text from Ulysses. (see 2017)

Joanna Newsom’s song “Time, a Symptom” on her Divers album contains reference to the closing passage of the Wake: “Joy! Again, around–a pause, a sound–a song: a way a lone a last a loved a long“.

Woodwind instrumentalist and composer Seán Mac Erlaine performs Alas Awake in Dublin, a site-specific homage to the Wake. (see 2017)

Shaun Davey and Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill write a song cycle about Nora Barnacle. (Thanks to the James Joyce Gazette for this!) (see Davey, 1999)

UCD professor Fran O’Rourke and classical guitarist John Feeley collaborate on the album JoyceSong: The Irish Songs of James Joyce.

Subtle Monkey records the song “Wake Again, Finn“, using text from the Wake.

Andrew Basquille and Eric Sweeney adapted Ulysses as an opera. (see Basquille, 2013)

The Science of Deduction’s album Blue Ocean Rising, Red Blood Running includes a track “James Joyce is Going Blind“. (see 2017)

2016
Waywords and Meansigns releases the Second Edition, setting Finnegans Wake to music unabridged a second time. Each chapter is recorded by a separate artist or group. Contributors mentioned elsewhere in this bibliography include Steve Gregoropoulos, Nicci Haynes (cover art), David Kahne, Mary Lorson, Mr. Smolin and Double Naughty Spy Car, and Maharadja Sweets.

Maharadja Sweets releases The Caprice of Young Gods, featuring “The Giant Awakes Again“, a song inspired by the Wake. (see previous entry, and 2017)

The Irish hip hop comedy duo the Rubberbandits learn how to become true artists from James Joyce and Samuel Beckett in the Rubberbandit’s Guide to the Internet, produced by RTÉ.

Josephine Foster releases No More Lamps in the Morning on Fire Records, featuring a musical arrangement of Joyce’s poem “My Dove, My Darling“.

The Japandroids album Near to the Wild Heart borrow its title from Joyce.

“Descent of Their Last End“, a song from the shoegaze band Kestrels, takes its title from Joyce’s short story “The Dead”.

Albanian musician Jona Xhepa’s “Asaman” uses a distorted cassete of Jim Norton reading Finnegans Wake.

Beta Harem MC’s “Finnegan’s Bake” is about getting high with James Joyce.

Jonathan Brielle premieres his musical Himself and Nora, about the relationship between Joyce and his wife Nora Barnacle.

Montréal noise band Demoiselles release their album Wake, which includes the track “riverrun”.

Grant Morgan, a sophomore at The Peak School in Frisco, wins the Summit Music and Arts Young Composer Competition for his Joyce-inspired piece “Finnegans Fall”.

When asked about the legacy of the Allman Brothers Band, drummer Butch Trucks said, “What I’m most proud of is taking the door that Cream opened with rock improvisation and adding John Coltrane, Miles Davis, Charlie Parker and jazz into the mixture… Charlie Parker is probably the greatest example of this. I mean, listening to Charlie Parker is like reading James Joyce. You’ve got to really dig into it, and if you really climb into what he’s doing, the melody is there, it’s like deep listening.”

The River Has Many Voices cites Joyce as an inspiration for his songwriting: “Books and poems have been some of my favorite music. They reach a depth of musicality that much music is too limited to reach… James Joyce showed me how the number of chords are endless in prose.”

Composer Dave Malloy is working on “Impossible Novels Trilogy“, which includes setting Moby Dick and Ulysses to music.