Jazz Articles about Michael Buckley

About Michael Buckley

Interview

An early spring vacation to New York saw Michael Buckley and his wife take in what he describes as “the usual sights." But for the Dublin saxophonist that also meant trips to “three or four saxophone shops." Once a tenor saxophonist, always a tenor saxophonist. Buckley, in fact, started out on the flute, playing with George Coleman no less, on the stage of Dublin's National Concert Hall when aged just ten. It is an instrument he still wields ...

Album Review

Michael Buckley: Ebb And Flow

Read "Ebb And Flow" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
April 15, 2025

Given his world-class chops, tenor saxophonist Michael Buckley's albums have been too infrequent. This is a man who has played with George Coleman when he was still in shorts (Buckley that is), backed Jerry Lee Lewis, collaborated with Dave Liebman and Kenny Wheeler, and toured with The Mingus Big Band. His talents as a composer for television and film, and as a producer--Buckley runs his own Dublin studio--also impose demands on his time, so a new album from the Dubliner ...

Live Review

Michael Buckley & Hugh Buckley At Magy's Farm

by Ian Patterson
April 3, 2025

Michael Buckley & Hugh Buckley Magy's Farm Dromara, N. Ireland March 22, 2025 If the flapping of a butterfly's wings on one side of the world can cause a tornado on the other side--or so the theory goes--then surely the ripple effects from one flight cancellation would be no less significant. For the small band of jazz fans making their way to Magy's Farm, a unique concert venue in hilly Dromara, the only ripple ...

Album Review

Lee Meehan: Some Of Us Are Looking At The Stars

Read "Some Of Us Are Looking At The Stars" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
February 22, 2024

Guitarist Lee Meehan has been a key player in Dublin blues and soul bands since the early 2000s. The blues proved to be a handy apprenticeship for the jazz degree Meehan would later pursue, graduating from Dublin City University in 2019. And it is to jazz that Meehan turns on his debut album as leader, a vehicle not just for his considerable six- string agility, but for his compositional, arranging and leadership qualities as well. Nor has Meehan ...

Album Review

John Donegan - The Irish Sextet: Light Streams

Read "Light Streams" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
February 20, 2024

Irish pianist John Donegan may not be a household name, but the Cork musician has walked with giants, playing with the likes of Art Blakey, Art Farmer, Barney Kessel and Ireland's own jazz great, guitarist Louis Stewart. He has also been on something of a roll with his Irish sextet, with Light Streams quickly following on the heels of Shadows Linger (Jayde Records, 2022). And with a third sextet album on the near horizon, Donegan is enjoying an Indian summer. ...

Album Review

Stella Bass: Look For The Silver Lining

Read "Look For The Silver Lining" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
February 7, 2024

It is an enviable trait to always look for the silver lining in troubled times. For Dublin vocalist Stella Bass, when gigs dried up during the Covid pandemic, the silver lining was the gift of time. She did not waste it, studying music production with Berklee College, Boston, and music composition & arranging with Studio Orchestrations, Belfast. The seeds planted, work duly followed, with writing, arranging and syncing music for TV, film and gaming. She also decided that it was ...

Album Review

John Donegan - The Irish Sextet: Shadows Linger

Read "Shadows Linger" reviewed by Ian Patterson

by Ian Patterson
January 11, 2023

Shadows Linger is the seventh album from veteran Irish pianist John Donegan, whose dedication to jazz dates back to the '70s when he played on the scenes of his native Cork and later Dublin, before moving across the pond to England. While in Dublin, Donegan worked with the Irish legends guitarist Louis Stewart and drummer John Wadham as well as tenor saxophonist Dick Buckley, whose saxophone-playing sons Richie Buckley and Michael Buckley feature here in a potent front-line which also ...