Turn it Up: John Kelly
Toner Quinn
For over a decade, John Kelly has been broadcasting his own distinct mix of music on national radio, first with the BBC, then Eclectic Ballroom on Radio Ireland (now Today FM) and Mystery Train on RTÉ Radio 1, establishing a reputation as a broadcaster who is always at the musical cutting edge, and building a particularly loyal listenership. His current show, JK Ensemble on RTÉ Lyric FM, is a rarity in Irish broadcasting, mixing classical, traditional, jazz and the avant-garde on weekday daytime national radio, and it has just reached its second year. In this interview, Toner Quinn, Editor of JMI, talks to John Kelly about his views on broadcasting, the current Irish music scene, the artists he admires and the listenerships that aren’t being catered for.
Toner Quinn: It’s a little over two years since the JK Ensemble began on RTÉ lyric fm. What were your ambitions when the programme started?
John Kelly: The first thing I had to ensure was that it didn’t appear as a half-assed version of the previous programme, Mystery Train. There were a lot of people saying to me when I moved to Lyric to just do what I always do. That wasn’t on. I knew that. The plan was to do a programme that was completely different. That was the challenge. I talked with Lyric for a solid month, with Aodán Ó Dubhghaill [Head of RTÉ Lyric FM], trying to work out if it would work for them and if it would work for me. Obviously I wasn’t going to go in there and play Vivaldi all day or whatever CDs some producer handed me. Aodán didn’t want me to do that anyway. He wanted me to do my own thing, but I knew I couldn’t do what up until that point had been my own thing.
TQ: How would you define your ‘own thing’?
JK: At the core of my musical interest is black music, that is, R&B, blues, funk, rap, and a lot of contemporary music which might be sonically aggressive, i.e. there is drums in it. That is...
