Jazz Festival Brasil 2009
Apologies for my extended absence. I’ve been slightly overwhelmed by a new ‘gig’ and I’m just getting life back in order!
A few months ago I took on the job of Artistic Director for Jazz Festival Brasil, foolishly thinking I’d have lots of fun organising the biggest festival of it’s kind in the country. I’ve since discovered new extremes of bureaucracy and, thusly (not a proper word but I love it anyway) new depths of stress! There is, literally, paperwork for everything – which has to be printed in triplicate, at the least, and signed and then have the signature authenticated before going on to someone else who kindly tells you you’ve omitted a particular word which HAS to be used, and therefore you will need to re-do the entire process from scratch. I’ve also been amazed at the huge differences between musicians’ organisational skills. I was ‘brought up’ by a particular group of musicians to whom professionalism, punctuality, appearance and high levels of musicianship were utmost. I presumed, naively, that everyone was like that. When I arrived in Brazil, I was (and continue to be) infuriated by the general lack of professionalism. I have recently discovered that it exists everywhere! There seems to be no middle ground here – one is either professional in the extreme or a completely disorganised mess!
Anyway, the Festival starts next week in Recife, on the north coast of Brazil. We then go down to Rio de Janeiro and up to Belo Horizonte, where I live. One of my initial goals was to open up the scope of the festival. It was always more traditional jazz for the entire festival, which I felt was very narrow minded. Luckily the producer of the festival, Leo Soltz, agreed and we started working on different approaches. This is obviously something which doesn’t happen overnight, especially as the festival is in it’s 7th year. This year, in addition to Bob Wilber/Dany Doriz, Jazz 6 (led by the wonderful Brazilian author Luis Fernando Verissimo) and the official Jazz Festival Brasil Band with special guest Kristine Mills, we are bringing up the Gangbé Brass Band from Benin, South Africa. This is hopefully the start of an interesting new chapter and one that I hope will bring plenty of new friends along.
Last year I wrote a daily blog whilst on tour with Judy Carmichael during this very festival and I will try to do the same this year. As I will be writing from a different perspective it’ll be interesting to compare the two afterwards!
As always, please let me know if there is anything specific you’d like to hear about.
Tags: blogging, jazz blog, Jazz Festival Brasil, marketing, Performance, touring
- August 11, 2009
- Posted under marketing, Performance, touring
- 5 Responses
wow! congrat’s (I think…hehe! You’ve got your work cut out for you)! Best of luck.
I’d love to return to Brazil some day, especially if I could play with you!
best wishes,
Jon-Erik Kellso
Thanks Jon, I think! Although they weren’t considerate enough to cut the work out for me – I even have to do that myself, hehe!
I’d love to get you down here again! We should do something with Ehud too!
Cheers,
please consider us for next year’s Brasil Jazz Festival. you can see a video of us at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMxQ4RHlUbs.
We have been working on a international cultural exchange program with some musicians in Aracaju, Sergipe and New Orleans for the past 10 years. if you go to http://www.youtube.com and search for carlitosev, you can see some of the music that has resulted from this collaboration.
we are working with the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Foundation, who will soon start a travel fund to help New Orleans musicians travel to international festivals to perform. They would like to help musicians who can go to several festivals in the same country. We will be traveling to the Northeast of Brazil next August to perform at festivals in Paulo Alfonso, Aracaju and Salvador. You would not have to pay our travel costs. we also work with a local group of brazilian musicians.
Latin jazz harpist & composer, Patrice Fisher, has been performing and recording
her own compositions since 1980. She has recorded 13 albums of original music, including her latest CD, “Sunset.” She has performed at such international
festivals as the Cancun Jazz Festival, the Jambalaya Jazz Festival in Ilhabela, Brazil, theTrova Jazz Festival in Guatemala and the Festi Jazz in La Paz, Bolivia.
“An unexpected delight!†raves David Fricke of Rolling Stone Magazine. Gene
Scaramuzzo of Gambit newspaper says of Arpa “There are many sides to this local
composer/harpist. It’s not unusual to see her play a staid classical gig in the morning and a smoky music club at night. Strong rhythms form the undercurrent of her instrumental music with Arpa.”
You can see videos of Patrice Fisher’s original compositions at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jMxQ4RHlUbs. You can hear music clips of patrice’s music at http://www.myspace.com/patricefisher.
And read more about her at http://www.patricefisher.com.
Live in Washington DC. I am planning on attending a jazz festival in Brazil 2013. Would you recommend which or the best to attend
Thanks
Carl
Hi Carl,
Sorry for the HUGE delay in replying, I’m back on the ball now. I’m not sure yet if we will run Jazz Festival Brasil this year, but I can highly recommend the Savassi Festival in Belo Horizonte. The link is http://www.savassifestival.com.br They haven’t released the line up yet but last year they had some killer bands from all over the world, including Darcy James Argue and Hermeto Pascoal. If I think of any more I’ll let you know – let me know when you’re thinking of coming.
Best,
Nik