Ireland's third city - jazz is beyond partition - was another world this weekend. Yes, the candidates or their representatives, were visible in Cork but the 40,000 or so jazz pilgrims in the city were oblivious to them.
Kenny Barron, a prodigiously inventive American pianist, was asked by a reporter if the names McAleese, Banotti, Roche, Dana, and Nally conjured any musical resonance for him. "What is that man talking about?" wondered Kenny.
The musicians and the devotees were concentrated on an altogether different campaign, surviving Cork and hearing some of the best jazz American, European and Irish musicians can offer.
Bobby Watson is a big dreadlocked sax player from Kansas. He captured the mood of the Guinness Jazz Festival. "We're going to swing ourselves into bad health this weekend," he said. We did. Oh, we did.
Energy dissipates of course, but gradually, happily, joyfully, over four mornings, four days, four nights of music that nurtures the soul. The jazz righteous are bold and broke. Never mind.
Who were the busiest people in Cork? Well, there were 1,000 musicians pumping out everything from free chaotic jazz, to sensuous ballads, to something called acid jazz. Then there were the thousands of bar staff dispensing black porter and amber whiskey and lager and the colourless stuff.
Guinness tell us that the festival attracts 40,000 punters. We hear a figure of £4 million being spent. They must be joking - some £4 million to the power of three might be more like it.
It was an exciting festival. Everybody was catered for. The seats were taken out of the Cork Opera House so that the rock fraternity could hear acid jazz and a "G Club Mix", described as an "eclectic melange of contemporary sounds and music styles". Hmmm.
This created some concern that Guinness is going to lead the festival down a more populist route but the festival director, Mr Brian Brown, reassured us this was not the case.
And that was fair enough because at the Festival Club in the Metropole Hotel, and in a new intimate venue close by, the Everyman Palace, we could hear jazz that ranged from the powerhouse to the soulful and lyrical from greats such as Watson and Barron, Cedar Walton, Jackie McLean, Johnny Griffin, Larry Coryell, Billy Cobham, Oliver Jones and Peter Appleyard. Wonderful stuff.
It was a swinging weekend and no place for the faint-hearted. But how many weeks to Christmas? Back to bread and butter for thousands between now and then. Never mind, we survived. Just.
