The Minister for Arts and Heritage, Ms de Valera, has announced the membership of the board of the National Concert Hall for May 2001 to May 2006.
Four members of the outgoing board have been re-appointed, including the chairman, Dr Dermot Egan, a former deputy group chief executive of AIB Group and currently adjunct professor at DCU Business school. This is the first time in the hall's 20-year history that a chairman has been re-appointed.
The other re-appointees are Ms Ann Fuller, administrator of the AXA Dublin International Piano Competition, Mr John McNally, chief executive, corporate banking and financial markets, Ulster Bank, and Ms Marie Louise O'Donnell, lecturer, faculty of humanities, DCU.
The new members are Ms Loretta Brennan Glucksman, president of the American Ireland Fund, Mr Sean Braiden, managing director of AirConsult, Mr Bob Collins, director general of RTE, Mr Finghin Collins, pianist, Mr Michael N Conlon, chairman of Bord Gais Eireann, Ms Fionnuala Hunt, artistic and music director of the Irish Chamber Orchestra, Mr Jerome Hynes, chief executive of Wexford Festival Opera, Ms Peggy McCarthy-MacIntyre, director of St Mary's College, Notre Dame's Ireland programme at NUI Maynooth, Ms Carmel Ryan, administrator of the Dublin Youth Orchestras, Garry Shannon, traditional flute player, and Ms Patricia Slavin, assistant principal of St Mary's National School, Dublin.
The new board takes office at a difficult time. The NCH has reached a stalemate with RTE over the renegotiation of a three-year rental contract for the use of the hall by RTE's performing groups. RTE is resisting the hall's attempt to raise the rental to close on half a million pounds, and is arguing instead for a serious reduction.
