Although the Guinness Jazz Festival opened in Cork last night, the real action at the Everyman, the Metropole and the Triskel begins today and effectively ends tomorrow. Monday's programme, as is usual now, is shrink-wrapped to the point of relative anti-climax.
There's little anti-climactic about the main events. The Saturday line-up in the Everyman features groups led by T. S. Monk, David Sanchez, Courtney Pine and Larry Goldings; of these, the most interesting may well be saxophonist Sanchez's Latin Obsesion and Monk's band, which has two notable players in trumpeter Don Sickler and altoist Bobby Porcelli. Goldings has been in Ireland in the recent past, while Pine is something of a musical chameleon. Postconcert entertainment comes from singer Honor Heffernan and her trio.
Sunday at the Everyman promises to be more exciting. The evening pairing of the Mingus Big Band and young trumpeter Roy Hargrove's quintet will attract most attention, but one of the world's great bassists, Dave Holland, leads a cutting-edge quintet there in the afternoon, which includes the remarkable saxophonist, Chris Potter and Holland's longtime colleagues Robin Eubanks and Steve Nelson; sharing the bill will be saxophonist Michael Brecker backed by a trio including Goldings. Holland and Hargrove can also be heard at the Metropole tonight and T S Monk will be there tomorrow.
The Met's foreign legion is typically varied; guitarist Russell Malone (so impressive backing Diana Krall on her Dublin visit) leads a quartet, as does the emerging San Francisco bop saxophonist, Virginia Mayhew, while one of the most interesting visiting groups may turn out to be drummer Ralph Peterson's Fo'tet, not least because of the quartet's eclectic background.
Some visitors are mixed with Irish musicians at the Met. One of the great veteran bop altoists, Frank Morgan, leads a quartet which includes Noel Kelehan; the superb trumpet craftsman, Lew Soloff, joins Richie Buckley in a curious sextet which includes British drummer Martin Drew and four Croats; and American tenor Don Braden joins Louis Stewart and Spanish pianist Albert Sanz, Jeremy Brown and Stephen Keogh in a group where the potential for stylistic collision is high. Leading the Irish groups at the Met will be Michael Buckley and the Guilfoyle/Nielsen Trio, the Justin Carroll Trio and the Nigel Mooney Organisation.
And Irish groups will be heavily involved in the Met's significant latin element - Havana 'Che, Rhythms of Bahia and Brasiliana - although the main touch of Brazilliance will come from percussionist Nana Vasconcelos's band. Singer Melanie O'Reilly's Celtic Cool will be there, too. The Triskel's programme is small but heavyweight. Tonight and Sunday night's big attraction will be the West Coast veteran trumpeter, Conte Candoli, backed by a superb British rhythm section in Dave Newton, Andy Cleyndert and Steve Brown, with the marvellous reedman, Alan Barnes, sharing the front line.