Kicking off officially this Friday, June 10, at the Hamilton, the DC Jazz Festival, now in its 12th year, will roll on throughout the city with its Jazz in the ’Hoods component, including the East River Jazz Fest Series and the Capital Bop Jazz Loft Series. After giving a spectacular Salute to Howard University on June 13, the festival will roar to a tentpole finish June 17 to 19 with DC Jazz Fest at the Yards on the Capitol Riverfront, overlooking the Anacostia River.
If the festival — founded by Charlie Fishman — has done anything in a time when a multitude of musical genres are vying for attention, it’s to show off the scope, the range, the flavor and the embracing and bracing nature of jazz musical forms.
“I hear all about people talking about jazz sort of going out of style, or dying,” said Artistic Director Willard Jenkins in an interview. “I don’t believe that at all. It’s bigger than ever, but it’s not the same, and that’s the exciting part. There’s some sort of debate about old jazz and new jazz, and I think that’s missing the point about jazz. Jazz, first and foremost, is all about innovation. Its core is improvisation, which means it’s going to change, to be responsive to new things. It’s going to react to what’s going on elsewhere in other genres, but other countries as well.”
“I think you’ll see in this festival the international influence that exists,” said Executive Director Sunny Sumter. “We’ve attempted to highlight the range of international jazz — people influenced by other styles in other places — by creating partnerships this year with several embassies, including France, Japan, Portugal and Italy.”
“You see that a lot,” Jenkins said. “There’s ska masters in Jamaica, creole music in New Orleans, the influences from jazz stars that come from Israel, Turkey, India. It’s a worldwide thing now, and the festival reflects that.”
At the same time, “We honor the past, sure, and this year we’re having a very special night,” Jenkins said, referring to “A Night at the Kennedy Center: DC Jazz Fest Salutes Howard University,” an all-star concert that includes performers who are products of Howard’s distinguished jazz program. That would include Sumter herself, who will be singing. Also on hand will be NEA Jazz Master Benny Golson, now 87 and still going strong, gospel master Richard Smallwood, Greg Osby, Mark Batson¸ Raymond Angry and the group Afro Blue.
Along with Afro Blue, Howard has two other high-profile performance groups: the Howard University Jazztet and the Howard University Jazz Ensemble, directed by trumpeter Fred Irby III, a decades-long member of the Kennedy Center Opera House Orchestra, who will be honored.
The Howard salute, which marks a return to the Kennedy Center for the festival, is certainly a highlight, but the Jazz at the Yards weekend is a blockbuster by itself. Winding up the festival in spectacular fashion, Jazz at the Yards not only spotlights the electric and original vocals of Cecile McLorin Salvant, but also shines a light on the rising and youthful New York-based Igmar Thomas and the Revive Big Band, featuring singer/songwriter Bilal, hip hop artist Talib Kweli and saxophonist Ravi Coltrane.
Among the other performers will be Grammy Award-winning pianist, bandleader, composer and NEA Jazz Master Eddie Palmieri and his Latin Jazz Septet and, of special interest to Washingtonians, the Chuck Brown Band, putting out the Go Go sound originated by its late founder and namesake. Also in the mix at the Yards will be saxophonist and bandleader Kamasi Washington, saxophonist Fred Foss with a tribute to NEA Jazz Master Jackie McLean, E.J. Strickland & Transient Beings and performances by the three finalists of the festival’s innovative new jazz band competition. On Friday, Sharel Cassity and Elektra and Brazilian vocalist Cissa Paz are part of a free Grrls Rule event.
The Festival took a hit this year when Bohemian Caverns, a classic D.C. jazz venue, closed its doors this spring. “I imagine there are lessons to be drawn from that,” Jenkins said. “It was a big loss to the jazz community. But we still have a tremendous number of venues, proof that jazz exists throughout the city.
And that’s where the popular and innovative Jazz in the ’Hoods comes in, spreading its music and wings through 20 D.C. neighborhoods, in all sorts of venues, from churches to embassies to parks to restaurants and clubs. It’s the thing — started a few years back — that always makes the DC Jazz Festival a citywide festival, as well as one with bigger ambitions. Among the free performances are a “’Dis is ’Da Drum” series at the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage.
You can get a feel for the city’s soul and sound and identity and historical heritage just by checking out the range of venues, which include the African American Civil War Memorial Park and Museum, the Atlas Performing Arts Center, the Anacostia Playhouse, restaurants such as Georgia Brown’s, Mr. Henry’s, the Grill from Ipanema, Rumba Café and Georgetown’s Bistrot Lepic and Malmaison, the D.C. Alley Museum, the Dorothy I. Height/Benning Neighborhood Library, Farragut Square, the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue and Jazz Alive at UDC.
