At Jazz Ireland, we’ve always been passionate about connecting people with the vibrant and ever-evolving Irish jazz scene. Today, we’re thrilled to announce the launch of a brand-new video series, In the Groove. This exciting series is dedicated to celebrating the stories, artistry, and people that make jazz in Ireland so unique.

What is In the Groove?

In the Groove is a deep dive into the lives, inspirations, and creative processes of the extraordinary musicians who shape the Irish jazz community. Each episode features in-depth interviews, candid conversations, and exclusive behind-the-scenes insights. Whether you’re a long-time jazz enthusiast or new to the scene, this series promises to inspire, inform, and entertain.

Read more: Introducing Jazz Ireland’s New Video Series: In the Groove

Personnel: David Redmond (b), Jason Rigby (ts), Bill Carrothers (p), Kevin Brady (d) Recorded in Munich, Germany, 2012

Ah 2012… it was a very good year… at least for blue-blooded girls of independent means. Unlike what the Frank Sinatra classic suggests I personally didn’t get to ride in many limousines that year, however bassist Dave Redmond did release a record that thirteen years later has found its way onto high rotation on my CD player this month. That’s right, CDs. From my cold dead hands Daniel Ek, cold dead hands. They are coming back I tells ya. Trust me on this.

Roots, released by the Spanish Fresh Sound label where Ireland’s own Redmond and drummer Kevin Brady share the roster with names like Avashai Cohen, Ethan Iverson and Brad Mehldau, showcases ten original tunes which betray a maturity and compositional prowess that does their leader proud. Joined by New York based saxophonist Jason Rigby and Michigan pianist Bill Carrothers, with whom the lads have quite an extensive playing history now, the record certainly holds its own more than a decade later.

Read more: Album Review: Blast From The Past - David Redmond - Roots

(The Ghost of Christmas Past)

Celebrating Christmas and also celebrating the 90th anniversary of the campaign to ban jazz in Ireland, which seems to have failed.

Read more: The Christmas Box 2024

The celebrated composer, orchestrator and arranger, and sometime trumpet player, Quincy Jones, died November 3rd aged 91. The Hot Box looks at the jazz contribution he made in the latter part of the 20th century, with tracks from Frank Sinatra, Sarah Vaughan, Ray Charles, Nat King Cole and the man himself.

Read more: The Hot Box #133 - Remembering Quincy Jones

Shane Latimer is one of the most truly unique musicians I know. Not merely a prodigious talent when playing straight-ahead Jazz, he is also a singularly arresting practitioner of Free Jazz and “Improvised Music” (whatever that is). In recent years he has turned his death-ray-like musical stare in the direction of electronica, using synthesisers and other occult means of interacting technologically with sound to produce consistently surprising results. The result of his years of experimentation is Residuum available through Diatribe Records, the title of which is allegedly not a commentary upon the government’s housing policy.

It would serve you well to cast aside any assumptions you may have about both Jazz musicians and electronic music before you enter Latimer’s world. This is not your father’s Jazz-musician-makes-electronic-stuff album. I could not possibly begin to assign any sense of genre to this music. It is surely a record filtered through the guitarist’s exceptional knowledge of aesthetic, form, harmony, and structure, however the result reveals itself like a fractal landscape of sonic shapes and events that sprout new lands and new topography at every turn. Expectation and supposition are the enemy of experience here. Comparisons or congruencies don’t apply. This music is its own thing and I advise clean ears when approaching it.

Read more: Album Review: Shane Latimer – Residuum