Canberra’s midwinter celebration of jazz continues to grow as the highly anticipated third year of the Capital Jazz Project, a ten-day jazz music event complete with original improvised and scored work, spontaneous invention, adventurous arrangements, standards re-examined, and some serious inventive and innovative projects, hots up Canberra’s cultural calendar.
Featuring over 100 international, national and ACT-based artists, over 20 performances and ensembles, workshops, masterclasses and artists aged from their teens to their eighties Capital Jazz Project is imagined with the soul aim of nourishing jazz artists and audiences in a joyful manner. A strong aspect of the event is the profiling of the Canberra jazz diaspora who heavily feed into the musical landscape of Australia.
The 2013 line-up features a heady mix of talent from around Australia with a particular a focus on artists working in multiple styles and across artforms including: THE JACÁM MANRICKS QUARTET with Paul Grabowsky, Jacám Manricks, Alex Boneham and Andrew Gander; NATHAN HAINES [with Kevin Field, Mark Sutton, Tom Botting]; THE TAWADROS BROTHERS AND STEVE HUNTER; THREE LANES [Andrea Keller, Genevieve Lacey, Joe Talia], BLOW, HANNAH JAMES TRIO, TIGHT CORNERS, ALEX AND NILUSHA [with Miroslav Bukovsky and Andrea Keller], MAG [Steve Magnusson, Dave Beck, Frank Di Sario], Andrew Dickeson, Brendan Clarke, Steve Barry, BABY ET LULU, THE STRANGE MUSIC OF REALITY, JOE CHINDAMO AND ZOE BLACK, ARREBATO ENSEMBLE, ALISTER SPENCE TRIO, TANGENTS, THE REUBEN LEWIS QUINTET, LIAM BUDGE DUO and THE UTOPIA COLLECTIVE.
2013 features Kiwi-Londoner and Warners Classics and Jazz Recording Artist Nathan Haines in his first headline performance in Australia with his internationally critically acclaimed latest albums The Poet's Embrace and Vermillion Skies.
Opening the festival in Street One will be Canberra’s John Mackey Quartet performing the World Premiere of Mackey’s Canberra Centenary Suite using the concert setting to draw an impressionistic musical landscape of the Canberra region. Street Two features Canberra’s ever- innovative Ben Marston Quartet launching a new improvisational concept for the group. Emerging Canberra artists featured include rising vocal star and 2012 James Morrison Vocal Scholarship Winner Liam Budge, virtuoso pianist Tate Sheridan with the Tate Sheridan Trio, The Reubin Lewis Quintet, and the Hannah James Trio.
Artist-in Residence will be musical agitators Tamil Rogeon and Ryan Ritchie of The Raah Project renowned for infusing their own original arrangements with electrifying strings, big-band beats and electronica mixed up with sublime vocals that span jazz to beat poetry, and strong visuals. Their compelling new vision will be delivered by a 20-piece ensemble from the ANU School of Music consisting of a string orchestra, horn section and jazz rhythm section and this performance will be the culmination of ten days of collaboration and searching for new ways to make music.
Capital Jazz Project includes mixed-form works drawing upon jazz such as: the theatre-music work Chet Baker: Like Someone in Love – a thrilling, dark theatrical performance from David Goldthrope exploring the haunting, unforgettable music that made Baker famous and the visceral, self-destruction that made him infamous; the partnership of celebrated Australian jazz pianist, composer, arranger, and improviser Joe Chindamo with outstanding classical violinist Zoe Black to share their reinventions of music’s great classics; and Melbourne-based Three Lanes – the brain child of Australia Council Jazz Creative Fellowship recipient Andrea Keller – creating new music with acoustic, electronic, prepared, improvised and composed elements with voraciously talented colleagues Genevieve Lacey and Joe Talia; and Baby et Lulu, a charismatic musical partnership between Abby Dobson [ Leonardo’s Bride] and Lara Goodridge [FourPlay], offer up a sassy, romantic jazz romp through Paris, full of swinging joie de vivre with songs from Gainsbourg, Piaf, Hardy, Aznavour, Camille and more.
Jazz cross-cultural projects include: Sydney´s ARIA-award winning oud (Arabic lute) and req (Egyptian tambourine) players Tawadros siblings Joseph and James collaborating with Steve Hunter one of Australia´s most brilliant jazz electric bass players; Alex and Nilusha led by Chilean born percussionist-composer Alex Pertout and Sri Lankan born vocalist-composer Nilusha Dassenaike; and the Arrebato Ensemble blending modern flamenco sounds and rhythms with jazz and improvisation.
Produced by The Street Theatre, a proven and nationally respected music and artistic hub, in association with Canberra 100 through the ACT Government Community Centenary Initiatives Fund and the Australian National University School of Music, Capital Jazz Project represents a long standing commitment to developing a national forum around jazz in Australia’s capital city through bringing top quality jazz artists together in Canberrra, profiling Canberra’s jazz diaspora, and revealing our city in its Alpine glory.
VENUE The Street Theatre, 15 Childers St, Canberra City West
SEASON Friday 2 – Sunday 11 August 2013
TICKETS $10 – $45 with a variety of discount ticket packages available
BOOKINGS 6247 1223 or www.thestreet.org.au
The Capital Jazz Project is proudly supported by the ACT Government Community Centenary Initiatives Fund.
