Limerick Jazz Festival 2025 unveils this year's line-up

Setting the scene and a shard torn from the lyrics of a popular song are somehow apt. “tears of joy that flow” spring to mind thinking of Limerick and a previous visit back in 2019. Denis Allen’s magical ‘Limerick You’re a Lady’ was an Irish no 1 in 1979. I heard someone play the chords of it at the end of a laidback curtain raiser of a gig at the O’Connell Street landmark the George Hotel happily enough on the keys I seem to recall. Its ubiquity at one time means it’s no surprise that even the local jazzers know it like it’s part of the furniture. The beauty that surrounds you again from the lyrics on numerous levels semantically apply but on a literal level yes Limerick and its environs are very handsome. And you can feel alive there, more to the point when the mood takes you to the river once again. A city of song and with venues like Dolan’s as punter and muso friendly as you will find anywhere, the jazz returns mercifully each autumn to take its place among the wider cultural offerings thanks to the great work of local volunteers, the tip top taste of drummer John Daly at the helm, a modicum of welcome funding from the powers that be and support of the music loving Irish public from across the Treaty county and from further afield turning out enthusiastically for their vital jazz fix.

Shaw thing Shannonside: vocals to the fore in September

“We are delighted to announce a really wonderful programme for our 14th Limerick Jazz Festival,” says John Daly, chair of Limerick Jazz Society. “With fringe events popping up in even more venues across the city, we’re reaching out to every music lover.”

Singers figure strongly this year in this An Chomhairle Ealaíon (Irish Arts Council) and Limerick City & County Council backed event.

The UK’s foremost male jazz singer Ian Shaw has been working on a yet to be released Stephen Sondheim project in recent times and plays the prestigious Belltable venue in a David Bowie and Joni Mitchell themed concert in one of the most eye catching elements of the 2025 programme.

‘White Noise’ from Brigitte Beraha’s brand new album, Teasing Reflections

Brigitte Beraha, photo: press, appears with Ant Law at the People’s Museum in Limerick on 27 September.

Also from the UK and recently in Ireland playing in Sligo, Brigitte Beraha will perform at the People’s Museum accompanied by Ant Law with whom she collaborated on their 2024 album Ensconced. Beraha’s band Lucid Dreamers has a new album called Teasing Reflections out in September. It’s the third album by the avant singer’s combination and it features reedist George Crowley, pianist Alcyona Mick and drummer Tim Giles.

Beraha is also a stimulating presence on the superb new Ant led Unified Theories featuring a full deck of players including Gwilym Simcock that here at least sheltering from the storm in the marlbank boreen we reckon is one of the year’s top jazz albums so far. That line from Krapp’s Last Tape applies if you make the leap: “Spiritually a year of profound gloom and indigence until that memorable night in March, at the end of the jetty, when suddenly I saw the whole thing.” Ah, why not, a bit of literary pretentiousness. But I digress.

Singer Deborah Swiney appears as a guest of the Nigel Mooney Trio at Dolans Upstairs in Limerick on 24 September.

September in Limerick also presents singer Deborah Swiney, who hails from Memphis, Tennessee, and was a backing singer for Al Green no less in the 1990s, Emilie Conway and Cormac Kenevey. Check out a super version of the Hoagy Carmichael-Johnny Mercer classic ‘Skylark’ that Swiney has released recently. Whatever you want to do/Is alright with me as a reaction to this fine streatment are words that spring to mind borrowed from the classic song of the Reverend’s.

Also to appear are Irish band Magical Dog, the Julian Siegel Quartet – Nottingham sax ace leader Wiggy is no stranger to Limerick – vibist Dimitris Angelakis’ Quartet and pianist Rory Conneally, who won the 2024 Young Irish Jazz Musician Competition. The John McLaughlin loving Magical Dog are named after a Jan Hammer composition and are formed of keyboardist Darragh O’Kelly, guitarist Joe O’Callaghan, bass guitarist Derek Whyte and drummer Shane O’Donovan. O’Kelly and O’Donovan are on Tom Caraher’s invigorating 90 Degrees issued earlier this year.