Cork revels in the annual jazz invasion

They're aiming for a golden vintage at this year's Guinness Cork Jazz Festival, so with the city geared up to impress we preview some of the best of what's on offer, writes ALAN O'RIORDAN

IT’S THE October bank holiday weekend and the cry goes up on Leeside: “Are you going jazzin?” Of course, what is often meant is “are you going drinking in the vicinity of some jazz?” or even, “are you going drinking with the possibility of walking past a pub or venue where you might overhear some jazz?” But while such festival dilettantes might be missing out on some world-class music, they are not entirely wrong to feel the atmosphere around the city on the Jazz weekend is a big part of the attraction.

Dublin’s jazz festivals come and go, each of them marked by quality players and acts, but they always have a feeling of being niche events for the cognoscenti. Not so Cork. The festival feeling is inescapable, even if you never see a saxophone the whole weekend and are content to see Therapy? instead of Charlie Haden.

Quite simply, the “Cork vibe” is the unknown quantity that makes the festival. When it’s at its best it’s hard to beat. A consequence of this characteristic is that festival veterans are not happy simply to hear great music. Instead, they think, “that’s good. . . but is it Cork at its best?” They carry with them an ideal of what the festival should be and can be – some suggest the classic year of 2005. Only the next couple of days will tell if 2010 is of a similar vintage.

START AS YOU MEAN TO GO ON

For a small and very convinced few, the festival truly begins not with Friday evening’s gig at the Everyman Palace, but in UCC. The campus is at its autumnal best around now, and the lunchtime concert is always a great appetiser. Playing this year are the One O’Clock Lab Band University of North Texas (they’re well named, with a Fringe gig in Devere Hall at 1pm among their scheduled performances) – an excellent big band from the first university to offer a jazz degree.

SEE A LEGEND AT THE EVERYMAN

Randy Weston, Benny Golson, Lou Donaldson, Cedar Walton, Roy Haynes McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Scott and Jimmy Smith are just a few of the elder statesmen to have visited the Everyman in recent years. It seems you can’t have a festival without one veteran of the golden age. For this year’s icon, look no further than Herbie Hancock (Saturday 8.30pm, in a double-bill with Jason Moran). At 70, Hancock is as energetic as ever, with a restless musical inquisitiveness exemplified by his current Imagine Project, where he collaborates with, among others, Lisa Hannigan and The Chieftains.

BE THEIR GUEST

The Guesthouse is one of Cork’s most interesting new venues. A hub for artists and musical experimentation, it’s found the perfect gig for its festival contribution. Step forward Portugal’s AJM Collective (Sunday, 2pm), free jazz improv merchants who match sound with visuals. Under the shadow of Shandon, visitors will be glad they left the festival’s MacCurtain Street hub and took in some of Cork’s urban landscape along the way.

SHOW THE KIDS THAT JAZZ IS COOL. . .

For those with offspring of a certain age, especially if they wear trousers that are far too big, Robert Glasper (Everyman Palace, tonight, 8.30pm) could be a bridge across the great musical divide between dad’s records and junior’s iPod full of noise. Glasper’s piano playing is typically layered over beats of a distinctly hip-hop feel. The result is an accessible style but one that does justice to its mix of academic and street sounds.

JOIN THE EURO ZONE

Austere music for austere times doesn’t sound all that tempting, but that’s what many of Europe’s best are doing – especially the Scandinavians. Cork has been accused of not paying due attention to new trends in European jazz, but in Norway’s Tord Gustavsen (Everyman, Sun, 2pm) the festival has one of the best pianists from this side of the Atlantic. And fear not, there is great warmth and melody in Gustavsen’s playing.

SEE A SET AT THE MET

The Metropole Hotel’s Festival Club is no longer the serious-listening venue it once was. Headliners are now mostly absent from its party-mode evening line-up. But afternoons in the hotel still have a relaxed, sociable and family-friendly charm. On Sunday at 1pm, check out Alex Mathias and his quartet. Berklee College graduate Mathias is a thrilling, vigorous, robust tenor sax player when he lets loose, and his band can be seen every Thursday in the International Bar in Dublin.

HIT THE JAZZ TRAIL

You’ll find live music in virtually every pub during the weekend. The Pavillion on Carey’s Lane boasts the likes of Yann Tiersen (of Amelie soundtrack fame) and Andy Smith (of Portishead) in the evening, but during the day the Pav has plenty of live action from Rouge with Anita Williams on vocals and the Booty Band. Excellent local gypsy jazz band the Tri-tone Trio play the Bodega, Corn Market Street, on Saturday at 2pm while you can wind down the weekend in style at the same venue on Sunday at 8pm and Monday at 3pm when Mitch Winehouse (father of Amy) plays with his band.

TAKE TO THE STREETS

Marking the completion of a pedestrian-friendly makeover of St Patrick’s Street, Grand Parade and environs, Cork City Council and Diageo will be placing several outdoor stages around the city centre. Irish and international acts will make sure there’s no escaping the music – and hopefully add to that all important Cork vibe. An outdoor food market will keep you well fed as you wander and listen.

AGONISE OVER TIMETABLE CLASHES

This is a core festival experience – especially in the good years. Sunday night: will it be Yann Tiersen, the funkadelic Maceo Parker, the tempting Three Voices line-up from the Triskel, Sligo’s guitar great Mike Nielsen or Steve Winwood? Begin tearing your hair out now. And bring back late-night gigs, we say.

REFUEL IN STYLE

You could grab a hot dog in the Metropole, but this is Cork – culinary capital. Why not head for the Cruibin on Union Quay. Their Friday night special, where guest chef Paco Guzman, a Basque from Barcelona, is making an eight-course Japanese tasting menu with Cork ingredients, is sadly sold out – but fear not, the same chef will host a jazz lunch on Saturday.

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