Coastal Companion

Your ultimate guide to the coast

Savannah Music Festival Opens

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Immediately following of the country’s biggest St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, the 2010 Savannah Music Festival opens on Thursday, March 18,2010, with a performance with Chinese pianist Lang Lang and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, along with Mike Marshall’s Big Trio premiering the newly-commissioned “Suite Savannah” on a co-bill with new favorites of western swing, The Belleville Outfit.

Bassekou Kouyate
Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba

Unique co-bills and original productions are staged in intimate venues throughout Savannah, Georgia, during the festival which continues through April 3rd. This is one of Savannah’s most popular festivals.

Some of the highlights in this year’s festival is violinist Daniel Hope’s Sensations chamber music series (this year featuring newcomers Mark O’Connor, Jeffrey Kahane, Gabriela Montero and Gautier Capuçon), the Savannah Jazz Party series with Wycliffe Gordon, Marcus Roberts, Henry Butler, Gerald Clayton, Dick Hyman and others, Bill Frisell’s Trio playing two nights alongside Malian powerhouse Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni Ba, the Del McCoury Band, Nicole Cabell, Wilco, Kristina Train, Yefim Bronfman, She & Him (featuring M. Ward & Zooey Deschanel), Ruthie Foster, Renaud Garcia-Fons, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis, and the debut of the all-new Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi Band with The Wood Brothers opening.

Below is a video of an “unplugged” performance with Bassekou Kouyate and Ngoni Ba on a roof top in Timbuktu

For a complete schedule or to order tickets visit www.savannahmusicfestival.org or call 912-525-5050.

Also, visit the latest episode of Tripping with Joe to find out what Joe has to say about the event.

Grant Supports New Jazz Technology Project – Savannah, GA

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Savannah Music festival awarded Jazz.Next Implementation Grant to support new jazz technology project

Savannah, Georgia –SWING CENTRAL, the nationally acclaimed high school jazz band competition and workshop produced by the Savannah Music Festival (SMF), is the subject of a new media project that utilizes technology to enhance the promotion of jazz music and education. SMF is one of only five recipients of first-round funding from the national Jazz.NEXT initiative, also including NPR, Monterey Jazz Festival, Walker Art Center and the National Federation of Community Broadcasters. The project is funded by Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation through the generous support of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. “Through this technology project, we’re making our unique jazz education efforts accessible to the masses,” remarks SMF Associate Artistic Director of Jazz Education, Marcus Roberts. “The internet is now a primary learning tool for people of all ages, and young people such as the participants in our Swing Central program will benefit greatly from the lessons, artist interviews and audio/video performances that will be hosted at swingcentraljazz.org.”

Over the next two years, the swingcentraljazz.org technology initiative will combine video and audio documentation of SMF’s jazz programs, social and other digital media, and traditional broadcast to promote its efforts to a broader audience, offer supplemental educational content to young jazz musicians, reinforce the creative and academic work of jazz artists, enhance communication between students and teachers, and connect members of the jazz community with each other. The Center for New American Media from New York City has been selected to handle video documentary work relating to the project, and Heideldesign from Savannah will be SMF’s digital media partner. In addition to its wide use within swingcentraljazz.org, the video documentation of the 2010 SWING CENTRAL program will be used to produce a documentary promoting the importance of mentorship and teamwork within the jazz tradition.

The Center for New American Media and its creative partners (Louis Alvarez, Andrew Kolker, and Peter Odabashian) have created some of the most honored and critically praised documentaries on American life and culture over the past 25 years. Twice winners of both the Peabody Award and the duPont-Columbia Journalism Award, their work, all of which premiered on public television, includes People Like Us: Social Class in America, Vote for Me: Politics in America, and American Tongues, which deals with American accents. Heideldesign, managed by lead designer and owner, Lee Heidel, has been on the leading edge of web design and development since 1998. Their web development work is featured on the newly redesigned savannahmusicfestival.org.