Moreover, Trinity's music department has been a mecca for professional jazz musicians interested in exploring the interface between music and technology, and the list of Irish musicians who have completed the Music and Media Technologies course there includes electronic jazz pioneer Roy Carroll and composer and organist Dylan Rynhart.

This year's Trinity Jazz Soc festival runs over four days at various venues around the city and features a mix of new and established groups from Ireland and further afield. Things get underway tomorrow night at 4 Dame Lane with a showcase of student bands, which promises everything from classic swing to funk. Then on Tuesday 20 February, Trinity stalwarts the Company, formed by members of the society in 2001, play the Bleu Note. This year's visitors are 100 NKA, a Polish trio fusing jazz, rock and electronics, who play JJ Smyths on Wednesday 21 February.

Rounding things off are Rynhart's 10piece ensemble, Fuzzy Logic, comprising many of the younger generation's most promising players, who play 4 Dame Lane on Thursday 22 February.

A>>Belfast meets Australia this week in the Galway Jazz Club with a visit of two of the Belfast scene's bright young things, drummer David Lyttle and guitarist Mark McKnight, to play with bassist Damian Evans. The drummer is no stranger to Dublin audiences, making the journey south at least once a week to play with Louis Stewart in his Thursday-night residency at the Bleu Note. Lyttle is also one of the prime movers on the Northern scene, leading his own groups and organising visits from Americans like Jamie Baum and Ken Peplowski.

They will be joined for the night by vastly experienced Australian bassist Damian Evans, now based in Galway and pillar of the Galway jazz scene. The David Lyttle trio play the Cellar Bar, Galway on Tuesday 27 February.

A>>Singer Dorothy Murphy has been one of the few voices in the vocal jazz wilderness over the last decade. Her latest group, Circleways, which can be caught in JJ Smyths on 25 February, features an unusual line-up with no chordal instrument, but rather a small ensemble that wouldn't be out of place on a classical stage, featuring SeA n A"g on soprano saxophone and bass clarinet, Kate Ellis on cello, Cormac O'Brien on bass and Phil MacMullan on drums.