Hancock, a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador, says it’s an opportunity to show appreciation for Japanese jazz fans who have been among the world’s greatest supporters of the music. He first performed in Japan with Miles Davis’ quintet in 1964, and has toured there with his own electric and acoustic groups for decades.Osaka was chosen as the host city because its jazz scene dates back to the 1920s and remains lively today, said Tom Carter, president of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz, who is partnering with UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova to present International Jazz Day.

“Osaka has played a leading role in the early days of jazz in Japan and in Asia,” Carter said.

“I was introduced to jazz while playing in a dance hall as a teenager during the American occupation by a Japanese jazz fan and record collector. He played Teddy Wilson’s ‘Sweet Lorraine,’ and I was hooked,” said pianist-composer Toshiko Akiyoshi, who will be performing with her husband, saxophonist-flutist Lew Tabackin, at the Osaka concert.

Akiyoshi, who came to the U.S. in 1956 to study jazz, gained worldwide acclaim first as a bebop pianist and later as the leader of her own big band, often writing compositions that drew on traditional Japanese music.

Hancock said International Jazz Day has “gone beyond our wildest expectations” since its launch in 2012.

UNESCO said Jazz Day events were held last year in all 196 member countries despite political, financial and security challenges. The organizers reached out beyond official organizations to work with hotels and restaurants, embassies, schools and musicians.

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Image by Mahmut Ceylan of Dale Barlow and Terence Blanchard, courtesy of International Jazz Day

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