The halls of 18th Century Dublin resounded with this music, much of it now rediscovered and recorded for the first time.

In the 18th Century Dublin was the second city of the Empire with a population only slightly less that London's, and was larger than most European cities. There was thriving music scene around the Dublin Castle area, where instrument makers and music publishers vied for the business of the wealthy. Handel' visit to Dublin for the premiere performance of Messiah attests to the quality of the musicians and choirs, and made Dublin an attraction for many composers from abroad including Dubourg, Geminiani, Bocchi and Castrucci. These composers wrote music for sumptuous balls at Dublin Castle, some of which rivalled London for their splendour.

Dublin's reputation in the 18th century as a significant European centre for composition meant there must exist a body of music that had not been performed since. The search for these was conducted at the National Library of Ireland, specifically the Joly Collection. Among the volumes was one containing Dublin Castle music for balls. Its was essentially and 18th century gig book, containing minuets, gavottes, maggots and rigadoons, notated in the form of a simple treble line and a bass line. This minimal material was realised by harpsichordist David Adams.

Spackling Band is made up of some of Ireland's leading specialists in the field of Baroque and Classical music and is committed to unearthing and performing little known works of that era on historically sensitive instruments. Francis ‘Spackling’ Dowdall was a member of the State Orchestra in Dublin Castle around 1720. He would have performed outdoors as a drum or trumpet player on horseback, and indoors as a flautist or oboist, and came to prominence in 1723 when he was dismissed after falling off his horse a number of times due to an ‘overly emotional state’ caused by too much wine at lunch!