Limerick Jazz Festival returns with ambitious programme

Artist-in-residence Dublin-born NJ resident David O’Rourke left his musical fingerprints everywhere. The Lime Tree Theatre Concert opened with Limerick Jazz International Big Band’s virtuosi. Suzanne Savage’s jazz-orchestrated ‘Dido’s Lament’ thrilled, before she turned 180º to ‘Can’t We Be Friends?’ Similarly, traditional Irish musician Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh, started by swinging Gershwin’s ‘S’ Wonderful’. Melodic US vocal gymnast Paul Jost refreshed Donovan’s Sunshine Superman.

Festival director John Daly approached O’Rourke with a plan to commemorate the 1919 ‘Limerick Bolshevik’ General Strike’s centenary. The Eternal Flame’s vast sensory mosaic followed three years gestation. Extracts from playwright Mike Finn’s humorous and richly poignant ‘Bread Not Profits’ outlined the strike with four actor/narrators, the Big Band playing O’Rourke’s richly harmonised score, ‘Ancór’. a 17-piece Chamber Choir, and vocalist Suzanne Savage. Projected photomontages gave visual context.

Thursday’s concert at UCH retold the 1951 album Charlie Parker with Strings (the original recording had three violins, viola & cello!) The familiar strains of ‘Laura’, ‘East of the Sun’ and ‘Anthropology’ counterpoised amongst others, Mercer Ellington’s ‘Moon Mist’ (recorded but not released on the album). US altoist David Lee Jones, and Valencia’s Jesus Santandreu’s tenor fronted a trio of John Donegan, Peter Hanagan, John Daly and a 16-piece string section with harp, flute, French Horn, and David Agnew on oboe that comprehensively swung the jazz players!

Intimate gigs in The Limerick City Gallery and Belltable Arts Centre balanced the larger offerings. Dolan’s Warehouse hosted three particularly stunning gigs. Vocalist/arranger Paul Jost fronted a unified quartet of daring, and polish, displaying rarely seen levels of in-band communication. Familiar songs were given fresh possibilities (McCartney’s Blackbird). Jost, Jim Ridl, Dean Johnson and Tim Horner were superb.

With musicality the watchword, Sara Dowling took on familiar standards and self-penned beauties, with Bruce Barth, Dario Di Lecce and Stephen Keogh.

Phil Robson/Jed Levy’s Quartet, with Dan Bodwell and Roberto Gatto sprayed the room with high-voltage originals and sensitive ballads, including ‘Three Card Trick’, a tribute to the late pianist Geri Allen. Watch for LJF 2023.