Professor Robert O’Dwyer was appointed to the Dublin Corporation Professorship of Irish Music in 1914 and in 1929 was appointed Professor of Irish Music in University College Dublin. He played a leading part in the musical and artistic life of the country and was widely known as an organist, teacher, conductor and composer. He was very active in the early years of Conradh na Gaeilge, and also had the distinction of composing the opera Eithne, the first written on an Irish subject in the Irish language. The opera was first produced by the Theatre Royal, Dublin c.1906.