Hit the high notes for Cork Jazz Festival
Former visitor to the Cork Jazz Festival, and famed Blue Note recording artist drummer Art Blakey, is part of Blue Note 85 exhibition.
It’s great that the Kino is now an official festival venue partner and the small Washington St venue, with a big cultural history, has gone through a number of different incarnations in recent years. When I was a teenager the Kino was a pool hall called Pot Black, but it was under the guise of Mick Hannigan that iy became an independent arthouse cinema in the 90s. Mick and co enjoyed a long run in the Kino, and I spent many dull rainy days inside, watching terrific independent cinema from all over the world.
The Kino eventually closed its doors as a cinema in 2009, and Mick, who spearheaded the Cork Film Festival for many years, eventually founded IndieCork Film Festival. The IndieCork Film Festival’s Tony Langois sadly died suddenly a few weeks ago, and will be sadly missed by the music and arts community in Cork.
The Kino itself has a busy and varied music and arts programme these days, and for the festival, they have a line-up that is 100% Irish-based.
The X Collective and friends, Kean Kavanagh, Projective, AbbieLee, CATHERINE, Soft Boy Records, DeCarteret, Rachel Mae Hannon, FoxGluv, Cook’s But We’re Chefs and Amy Michelle are some of the acts on stage there, and I’ll be running a club night myself there Saturday with Uncle Zen and friends including DJ Saidi. It’s a solid homegrown line-up that showcases some of the best jazz-related soul, hip-hop, funk, afrobeats and more, and it’s a welcome addition to the festival. The Kino is a venue that provides Cork promoters with another crucial underground option in a landscape that often doesn’t offer much variety for those not into harder dance music.
I’m also personally very excited about the Blue Note 85 exhibition which is happening in St Peters all weekend. This is a free event and it’s a good family-friendly option for those of you who want to head to town daytime with the kids. Blue Note is an iconic record label that continues to release important music in 2024 and the exhibition promises to be a treat for music fans of all ages. Art Blakey, Horace Silver, Donald Byrd, Herbie Hancock and many other jazz icons recorded for the label, which in more recent years has released music from Gregory Porter, Norah Jones, Madlib, Robert Glasper and Maya Delilah, who visits us this weekend for a show with Qbanna at Live at St Luke’s.
The St Peters Blue Note 85 exhibition will feature iconic photographs and album covers from the esteemed labels history, and Blue Note themselves will be delivering a pop up shop for the weekend, selling limited edition merchandise, vinyl and prints, in a first for Ireland. They will also feature a selection of stock from the Record Hub, Ireland's own vinyl emporium, and the Exhibition will host some podcasts and talks on Saturday and Sunday morning too. This will be a worthy successor to previous St Peters exhibitions that ran recently, and it’s a fantastic opportunity to check out the Blue Note experience in Cork.
I’m gonna do my best to check out Seun Kuti, Theo Parrish, Amadou & Mariam and other shows this weekend, and by the time you read this we’ll also have seen the much anticipated Brian Jackson show on Wednesday, celebrating the music of his iconic long time collaborator Gil Scott Heron. Apart from the main venues (Cork Opera House, Kino, St Lukes, Triskel, Everyman, Metropole, Cyprus Avenue, St Peters), there’s other gigs happening in nearly every venue too, and a huge Jazz fringe, so Cork will be buzzing all weekend. Among those not on the official list, the EMC are running some late-night club nights in the Liquid Lounge, and Nancy, Lone, and Soichi Terada are all coming, while Off Jazz is at the Roundy! There are many more shows too, but my final recommendation is for the Brick Nasty sessions at the Opera House next Sunday night, featuring a whole host of Ireland’s finest acts!
