Festival Favourites

Over ten years of magical memories the City of Derry Jazz and Big Band Festival has amassed a formidable array of hugely talented friends who are drawn back each year by public demand.

We begin with, who else, the man who is now synonymous with the festival and its incredible success. Of course, we’re talking Jools Holland. The most popular pianist and bandleader in the UK brings his irresistible 20-piece Rhythm & Blues Orchestra to the Millennium Forum on April 28th and 29th for two unforgettable shows. Don’t forget your dancing shoes!

You can get a close-up look at a future legend when the sensational thirteen-year-old Slovakian Andreas Varady, a jazz guitarist of precocious brilliance, appears at the Playhouse on May 1st. His supporting trio includes his father Bandi Varady on rhythm guitar and top local drummer David Lyttle, whose own group, including celebrated saxophonist Jean Toussaint and bassist Michael Janisch plays the same venue that evening.

Blues lovers, as always, have their own array of festival favourites to enjoy with the Lee Hedley Band, The Bluez Katz, The Pontiax and the sizzling slide guitar playing and soulful vocals of the Ronnie Greer Blues Band, all in town. Support a good cause when the Pink Ladies Breast Cancer Support Group present their biggest yet Strictly Come Dancing event in a spectacular marquee at the Gasyard Centre on April 29th. See if you can win the title of Derry’s best dancing couple as you dance to the Slammers Maximum Jive Band.

The amazing Mirenda Rosenberg, the US singer who has made Ireland, and this festival, her home, has charisma to burn, as well as dextrous vocal chords equally at home with the blues, jazz, soul or funk. Don’t miss the Festival Farewell Party which she and her band headline along with the equally high energy King Pleasure and the Biscuit Boys at the City Hotel on May 1st. For the ultimate party fun look no further than the Festival Finale Swing Party at DaVinci’s Hotel with the Jive Aces and Oo-Bop-Sh’Bam, two great festival favourites, also on May 1st.

There’s the superb Paddy Sherlock and Les Swinging Lovers, the 20-piece Brass Impact from Glasgow and the Mark Black Band with their pulsating fusion of roots, blues, rock and country. Look out too for a host of perennial favourites like the high-octane Ska Beat, rockabilly trio Cat Scratch Fever, the Roaring Forties and the Harry Connolly Band.