Ensemble photos by Clive Tanner
Elevation Ensemble is a group of leading professional musicians based in Galway, formed in 2025. The members have all recently made Galway their home, bringing west their national renown and reputation.
On its first nationwide tour in autumn / winter 2026 the group premieres the new multimedia presentation The Pale Blue Dot, a reimagining of NASA’s Voyager Golden Record from 1977.
New music for strings and electronics by Irish composers Linda Buckley and Jonathan Nangle, commissioned by Elevation Ensemble, is performed alongside selections from the Voyager Golden Record and stunning video projections by Manuela Corbari.
Elevation Ensemble is funded by the Arts Council Of Ireland.
Karen Dervan - Artistic Director / Viola
Galway native Karen Dervan is a musician and music manager who has enjoyed a hugely varied career in the arts in Ireland. Currently General Manager of New Music Dublin and a former co-curator of the Kaleidoscope multi-genre music series, Karen’s skills off the stage have been matched by her onstage credentials.
A regular performer as a viola player with all of the island’s orchestras and a busy chamber and recording musician, Karen was also previously a member of the post-rock collective 3epkano, with whom she made several appearances in the Brooklyn Academy of Music and the National Gallery, Washington DC. She enjoyed a close working friendship with the late Mícheál Ó Súilleabháin, sharing stages with him across Ireland for 15 years until the composer’s untimely death.
Karen is a recent recipient of the Arts Council of Ireland Music Bursary, the Galway County Council Arts Bursary and the Music Network Instrument Fund (Robert Sourzac baroque viola). Since returning to live in Galway in 2025, Karen has founded Elevation Ensemble and is busying herself to support music making and community building in the west of Ireland.
Daniel Bodwell - Double Bass
Daniel Bodwell is a highly versatile double bassist, performing and recording across classical, contemporary, jazz, and traditional genres. He appears regularly with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra Ireland, Ficino Ensemble, Crash Ensemble, and Quiet Music Ensemble.
A sought-after collaborator across Ireland's folk and jazz scenes, he has worked with artists including Mick Flannery, Aoife Ní Bhriain, Declan O’Rourke, Mary Coughlan, Nigel Mooney, Louis Stewart, Frankie Gavin, Sue Rynhart and Huw Warren.
Aoife Burke - Cello
Selected by The Arts Council as a recipient of a Next Generation Artist Bursary 2020, Aoife Burke leads a diverse career as a recitalist, chamber musician, orchestral player, curator and producer. Alongside the Elevation Ensemble, she is also a member of the Opalio Piano Trio and Kantos Quartet, supported by the National String Quartet Foundation.
An avid chamber musician, she has collaborated with notable artists including Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Arto Noras and Richard Watkins, and groups such as The Vanbrugh, Navarra Quartet, and the Gavin Bryars, Kirkos, Ficino and Crash Ensembles, appearing at festivals including West Cork Music, New Music Dubln, Cellissimo and the Clandeboye Festival, where she was awarded the Special Festival Prize.
Aoife holds a residency at Triskel Arts Centre in her native Cork, where she curates the Spotlight Chamber Music Series. As a session musician, she has recorded for artists including U2, Sinéad O’Connor, The Police, Ed Sheeran and Van Morrison.
Gina Maria McGuinness - Violin
Irish violinist Gina Maria McGuinness is a passionate chamber musician whose career has been shaped by a deep commitment to collaborative music-making. Inspired by formative years at the West Cork Chamber Music Festival and mentorship from the RTÉ Vanbrugh and Vermeer Quartets, she has gone on to perform alongside many of today's leading international artists at festivals throughout Europe, including the GAIA Chamber Music Festival in Switzerland where she is a regular guest.
Alongside her chamber music career, Gina has appeared as a soloist with orchestras in Ireland and abroad and is an experienced concertmaster and guest principal with leading European and Irish orchestras. She studied in Germany, the United States and Switzerland, earning top honours from Roosevelt University in Chicago and a Master's degree from the Haute École de Musique de Lausanne.
Now based in the west of Ireland, Gina is a founding member of the Gealán String Quartet, continuing to champion chamber music through performances, festivals and national tours.
Linda Buckley - Composer
Linda Buckley is a composer who creates electronic and acoustic music. Her NMC record From Ocean’s Floor was featured by Iggy Pop on BBC Radio 6 as “beautiful music – here is somebody really special”.
She has worked in many collaborative contexts including scoring film by Kathryn Ferguson (Nothing Compares co-composed with Irene Buckley, nominated for Best Score at the IFTA Awards), Mark Cousins (A Sudden Glimpse to Deeper Things), and Pat Collins (That They May Face the Rising Sun co-composed with Irene Buckley).
Recent commissions include new work for the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Iarla O’Lionáird and the National Symphony Orchestra, Crash Ensemble and piper Brìghde Chaimbeul. She was elected to Aosdána in 2021.
Jonathan Nangle - Composer
Jonathan Nangle is a composer whose work spans a wide range of fields, including notated acoustic and electroacoustic composition, live and spatially distributed electronics, video, field recordings, interactive sound installations, and electronic improvisation.
His compositions have been commissioned and performed internationally by ensembles and musicians, including National Symphony Orchestra Ireland, Crash Ensemble, Signum Quartet, Dublin Guitar Quartet, Chatham Saxophone Quartet, Irish Youth Choir, violists Jennifer Stumm and Nathan Sherman, violinist Darragh Morgan, cellist Marc Coppey, and pianist Thérèse Fahy.
Jonathan is a member of the composition faculty at the Royal Irish Academy of Music.
Manuela Corbari - Video Designer
Manuela Corbari is a Galway-based filmmaker, editor and interdisciplinary artist working across film, animation and immersive media.
A lecturer in Editing at ATU, currently on a career break, she creates visually driven work informed by cinematic storytelling, exploring how moving image, sound and performance can create engaging experiences for children and wider audiences.