6th Annual Panama Jazz Festival Set for January 12–17, 2009, Founder/Artistic Director Danilo Perez Announces

Posted on August 15, 2011 by AmateurPianists No Comments



xml:lang=“en” lang=“en” xmlns=“http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml”>

6th Annual Panama Jazz Festival Set for January 12–17, 2009, Founder/Artistic Director Danilo Perez Announces

Richmond, CA (PRWEB) November 13, 2008

American jazz saxo­phonist Wayne Shorter’s acclaimed quartet with Danilo Perez, John Pati­tucci, and Brian Blade, and the legendary Cuban pianist Chucho Valdés are among the head­liners at the 6th annual Panama Jazz Festival, which will take place in Panama City January 12 through 17, 2009. The Boston-based Pana­manian pianist Danilo Perez, who founded the festival in 2003 and whose Danilo Perez Foun­dation coor­di­nates its educa­tional component, antic­i­pates more than 16,000 attendees.

“The Panama Jazz Festival has been a magical journey to a dream we’ve had for years in Panama,” says Perez. “We, as a country, see the entire world pass through the Panama Canal every day, and we are honored to be the bridge of the Americas. But today, we are proud to say that every year–for the past six years–the Panama Jazz Festival has been the national event where the world does not pass by, but makes a stop in our wonderful land. The world’s best jazz artists, as well as students and volun­teers from all over the globe, unite in Panama with one goal in mind: to cele­brate the world’s diversity through jazz.”

The 2009 festival will be dedi­cated to the late bassist, composer, and arranger Clarence Martin Sr., whose contri­bu­tions to Pana­manian jazz date from the 1940s and have influ­enced several gener­a­tions of musi­cians from many genres such as jazz, clas­sical, and Caribbean music.

The festival will open with a gala concert at the Teatro Nacional by a flamenco jazz group from Spain, spon­sored by the Spanish Embassy. Other artists scheduled to perform at the festival are the Puerto Rican saxo­phonist Marco Pignataro and his quintet, featuring Eddie Gomez and Billy Drummond; American singer Luba Mason, whose quintet includes flute master Hubert Laws, bassist Jimmy Haslip, and vocalist Rubén Blades (Mason’s husband, and Panama’s Minister of Culture); and the young Pana­manian saxo­phonist Jahaziel Arrocha, who won a Berklee College of Music schol­arship at the 4th annual Panama Jazz Festival and currently attends Berklee as a Pres­i­dential Scholar.

Audi­tions for admission and schol­ar­ships to the New England Conser­vatory, Berklee College of Music, and the Conser­va­torio de Puerto Rico will be scheduled during the week of the festival. Also planned are ensemble, flute, trumpet, guitar, compo­sition, drum, bass, piano, and saxo­phone work­shops by the New England Conser­vatory Ensemble, led by jazz department chair Ken Schaphorst, and master classes by Berklee professors Jim Odgren and Jim Kelly. All classes will take place at the Ascanio Arosemena Educa­tional Center, on the Panama Canal Admin­is­tration Campus. Chucho Valdés, John Pati­tucci, Brian Blade, and pianist Edna Golandsky (with the Golandsky Piano Institute) are among the artist/instructors.

For the fourth consec­utive year, the Panama Jazz Festival will offer clinics and courses on music tech­nology under the auspices of the Berklee College of Music Production and Engi­neering Department (MP&E) and Music Synthesis Department (MS). Courses on recording, mixing, and live sound will be presented by Rob Jaczko, Chair of MP&E; Alejandro Rodríguez, Asso­ciate Professor of the MP&E Department; and Neil Leonard, Chair of Berklee’s Music Synthesis Department.

The keynote for the 2009 festival is “expansion,” notes Perez, as the concert lineup expands from 3 to 5 days a week and the scope of the master classes expands to include a new private lesson component. “We’re also reaching out even more than before to other disci­plines, such as art and dance, and we’re opening a clas­sical music department,” says Perez. “We’re expanding our schol­arship oppor­tu­nities to Pana­manian schools in need by giving admission to the festival to students who demon­strate academic progress. And we are expanding our children’s program to include even more commu­nities in need of outreach programs.”

A complete schedule of musical and educa­tional events, as well as infor­mation about festival travel packages, will be available at http://www.panamajazzfestival.com. Tickets will be on sale through the festival site as of December 1st.

About the Panama Jazz Festival logo:

“From Vazco Nuñez de Balboa’s 16th-century dream of uniting both oceans, to our 21st-century dream of uniting cultures and social classes through music, the Panama Canal has affected not only the global economy, but has also allowed an unprece­dented biological and cultural exchange since its opening in 1914.

“In the 2009 festival’s logo, the silhouette of our country and the visible trace of the Panama Canal is surrounded by a green sea that repre­sents our ecological and musical diversity (EcoMu­sical diversity), inviting the viewer to expe­rience the balance between human and natural sound.

“Today, we cele­brate our country’s heritage with jazz music, and even when we face great economic, social, and political chal­lenges, we can say that we are a nation with an immea­surable cultural legacy.” — Danilo Perez

# # #

Attach­ments

©Copy­right 1997-, Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.
Vocus, PRWeb, and Publicity Wire are trade­marks or regis­tered trade­marks of Vocus, Inc. or Vocus PRW Holdings, LLC.

Related Pianist Press Releases