The Detroit Jazz Fest has been a leader in presenting innovative and memorable theme-based programming, as evidenced by the past three festivals.
30th Annual Detroit Jazz Fest (2009) Keepin’ Up with the Joneses
You heard the ads – “Detroit International Jazz Festival, Baby – It’s All Here!” Well, it really WAS. With a great lineup and hundreds of thousands of the best fans you’ll find anywhere, we celebrated the music that defines Detroit, and the 30th anniversary of this signature event. . . . With the theme of Keepin’ Up with the Joneses, it was historically significant that we opened with the great Hank Jones and closed with a commissioned work by John Clayton honoring Hank and his legendary siblings, Thad and Elvin. More>
29th Annual Detroit Jazz Fest (2008) The Philly-Detroit Summit
Love really was in the air at the 2008 Detroit Jazz Fest. The festival’s theme, A Love Supreme, came from the heart, and the reunion of so many of our legends was fun AND touching. The highlights were too numerous to give just due. . . . Christian McBride raised the bar for any artist in residence in the festival’s future. Always accessible, always fun, he taught, performed with students, played with his own band, did a multitude of interviews, curated a Philly-Detroit summit, and put together an awesome tribute to one of Motown’s heroes, Marvin Gaye. More>
28th Annual Detroit Jazz Fest (2007) Rumble on the Great Lakes
Celebrating the jazz, soul and blues legacies of Chicago and Detroit, the Rumble in the Great Lakes engaged Chicago artists as disparate as Herbie Hancock, Kurt Elling, Otis Clay, Mavis Staples and Kahil El’Zabar. Representatives of the Motor City included Regina Carter (the 2007 Artist in Residence), Curtis Fuller, Yusef Lateef, Larry McCray, Ron Carter, Bettye LaVette and The Miracles. The roster also embraced the big band tradition, with three outstanding ensembles: the Gerald Wilson Orchestra, Charles Tolliver Big Band, and the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra. Poncho Sanchez, the Spanish Harlem Orchestra, and Conrad Herwig, rounded out the Latin programming. More>
