Meet the people who help bring the Cork Jazz Festival to life

With the Guinness Cork Jazz Festival in full swing, with up to 100,000 punters expected in the city, Ellie O’Byrne meets some of the business people who help to make it all happen

Grammy-winning jazz artist Gregory Porter headlines at the Cork Opera House for the opening night of Guinness Cork Jazz Festival on Thursday. Picture: Darragh Kane

Everyone has a story from the Jazz. For Joe Kelly, who has been booking gigs and running events in Cork for 34 of those years, one of his stand-out memories is the time that Sinéad O’Connor showed up to perform guest vocals with a UK dub soundsystem.

“On-U Soundsystem were coming in, founded by legendary dub producer Adrian Sherwood,” Mr Kelly recalls.