Belgrade Jazz Festival: Chicago Underground Duo Tonight
After Wednesday's opening with Vladimir Nikolov, Tino Tracanna and Chicago Underground Duo play the Belgrade Youth Center tonight, and Modrzynski Trio replaces Akimbo on Friday.
A festival that counts in concerts rather than impressions got its number at the opening. Dragan Ambrozic, program manager of the festival and head of the Department of Artistic Creation at the Belgrade Youth Center, said on Wednesday evening that the 42nd edition will bring the Belgrade Jazz Festival to 418 concerts since its revival in 2005, which he called an “incredible figure for any festival”. He added that “almost all of them were premieres, and they significantly enriched the cultural life of this area”.
We reported yesterday that the festival begins in the evening. At 7 pm in the main hall of the Youth Center, Vladimir Nikolov played with his nonet, the world premiere of the program “History Now”, which, according to the organizers, interprets the history of jazz in the language of today. At 9 pm Ana Popovic was on the bill, and according to the Youth Center’s announcement, it is the first time the festival’s biggest star comes from the world of blues.
What is playing tonight, October 22?
The second evening opens at 7 pm with saxophonist Tino Tracanna and his project “Panorchestra”. Italian critics named it the best jazz album, an award known as Top Jazz, and the octet with six wind players blends the New Orleans tradition with Italian musical romanticism. The organizers recall that Tracanna made an impression earlier too, in Paolo Fresu’s quintet.
At 9 pm it is the American scene’s turn: trumpeter Rob Mazurek and drummer Chad Taylor perform as Chicago Underground Duo. The Youth Center places them in a selection of American groups that shows how varied the genre is today on the soil where it was born. Later in the evening, at 10:30 pm, Spanish pianist Daniel Garcia Diego and Swiss vocalist Andreas Schaerer play as a duo.
What comes on Friday and Saturday, and what has changed?
Friday brings the Ivan Radivojevic Quartet with guest Rastko Obradovic at 7 pm. Trumpeter Radivojevic gives the premiere of the complete second album, “Not Quite Sun, Not Quite the Moon”, which the organizer describes as a blend of contemporary New York and Scandinavian melancholy. At 9 pm The Messthetics and tenor saxophonist James Brandon Lewis take the stage. The trio has its roots in Fugazi, as it was founded by bassist Joe Lally and drummer Brendan Canty, and the Youth Center bills the concert as the jazz event of the season in Belgrade.
The only change to the program concerns Friday’s “Seifert Night”: in place of the previously announced Akimbo, who cannot perform because of unforeseen circumstances, Michal Modrzynski Trio will play.
The finale is on Saturday, October 24. At 7 pm the quartet of Joao Paulo Esteves da Silve plays, whose release “Pais Distante” placed second in Portugal last year, and at 9 pm Marquis Hill Blacktet Revisited. Hill is a winner of the Thelonious Monk competition, and DownBeat magazine named him the greatest talent among trumpeters in 2016. The festival ends with a jam session, and there are 13 concerts in total. As many as 12 groups are performing in Belgrade for the first time.
A limited number of ticket bundles, valid for the eight main program concerts at 7 pm, can be bought at the eFinity box office in the Belgrade Youth Center. Single tickets for all concerts are sold at eFinity sales points and online.
