Presented by Moving on Music in association with Belfast International Arts Festival 2026, BlackGate is a new project from Irish double-bassist Caimin Gilmore (Crash Ensemble) that explores the world of contemporary music, pop, classical, folk, and other. Released to widespread acclaim in 2025 through the New Amsterdam (US) & Ten Spot (IRL) labels, their self-titled debut album is a genre-fluid gem that could slip into multiple sections of the most considered of record collections.

Performed by renowned cellist Kate Ellis, harpist Lavinia Meijer and Caimin Gilmore on Double Bass, the music is a cross-genre brew that pulls from Caimin’s hugely interesting and varied career. It had its world premiere at Kilkenny Arts Festival in 2024 and has since been performed at the New Music Dublin Festival, PS21 Chatham Groundtone Festival, the Phoenix Gallery Vermont, and The Bridge Studios in Brooklyn.

With a programme that also includes works by Philip Glass, Lavinia Meijer, Gabriella Smith, Benedict Schlepper Connolly and Ann Cleare, we are delighted to welcome BlackGate to Belfast. It’s a project that deserves the keenest ears in every city.

Gilmore’s staggering ‘Blackgate’ suite is a triumph of tonality and sonorities… a flurry of beautiful and brilliant ideas woven into an elemental odyssey of an album. The Goo

As much as this band is working in a neoclassical space, they are also extremely conversant in contemporary music, and this record really has its feet in both… It’s a beautiful record. NPR

elegantly choreographed. The Wire