On paper, at least, it looks spectacular:
Seven nights of top-notch jazz--mostly for free--with giants such as Sonny Rollins, Ornette Coleman and Dee Dee Bridgewater performing for thousands in front of Chicago's glittering skyline.
But as the Chicago Jazz Festival celebrates its 30th anniversary this week, the event stands at a turning point.
As the oldest of the city-sponsored downtown music festivals (the gospel, blues and country events all followed), the jazz soiree for years has struggled to break out of well-worn habits to create fresh new formats. The question is whether the pace of change has been brisk enough to keep the Chicago Jazz Festival competitive in a rapidly changing music world.
Counterparts such as the Montreal International Jazz Festival and the San Francisco Jazz Festival, for instance, spend fortunes on programming ($10.6 million for Montreal, $1 million for San Francisco).
The Chicago Jazz Festival--produced by the Mayor's Office of Special Events, which obtains funding from corporate and foundation sponsorships--musters an almost laughable $250,000.
Squeezing pennies Yet through sheer ingenuity, the Mayor's Office and the non-profit Jazz Institute of Chicago--which has programmed the festival since its inception--squeeze the most out of every penny. Global stars, Chicago icons and emerging players will light up three stages in Grant Park from Friday through Aug. 31. And though the city's perpetually strained coffers long ago shrank a Grant Park gathering that originally stretched seven days, the event's planners in recent years have added prefest concerts in various venues to create a sprawling, seven-day Chicago Jazz Festival Week, starting Monday.
The boldest experiment begins Thursday, when--for the first time--the “official" opening night of the Chicago Jazz Festival will unfold not in Symphony Center (where it has occurred in recent years), nor in Grant Park's acoustically challenged, aesthetically inferior Petrillo Music Shell.
Instead, the 30th anniversary opener will move up to the superb Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park, where Rollins will play a free, evening-length concert. For those who long have yearned for the Chicago Jazz Festival to evolve beyond the ramshackle environment and dubious production values of the Petrillo Music Shell, the one-night switch to Millennium Park comes as a breath of badly needed fresh air.
Seven nights of top-notch jazz--mostly for free--with giants such as Sonny Rollins, Ornette Coleman and Dee Dee Bridgewater performing for thousands in front of Chicago's glittering skyline.
But as the Chicago Jazz Festival celebrates its 30th anniversary this week, the event stands at a turning point.
As the oldest of the city-sponsored downtown music festivals (the gospel, blues and country events all followed), the jazz soiree for years has struggled to break out of well-worn habits to create fresh new formats. The question is whether the pace of change has been brisk enough to keep the Chicago Jazz Festival competitive in a rapidly changing music world.
Counterparts such as the Montreal International Jazz Festival and the San Francisco Jazz Festival, for instance, spend fortunes on programming ($10.6 million for Montreal, $1 million for San Francisco).
The Chicago Jazz Festival--produced by the Mayor's Office of Special Events, which obtains funding from corporate and foundation sponsorships--musters an almost laughable $250,000.
Squeezing pennies Yet through sheer ingenuity, the Mayor's Office and the non-profit Jazz Institute of Chicago--which has programmed the festival since its inception--squeeze the most out of every penny. Global stars, Chicago icons and emerging players will light up three stages in Grant Park from Friday through Aug. 31. And though the city's perpetually strained coffers long ago shrank a Grant Park gathering that originally stretched seven days, the event's planners in recent years have added prefest concerts in various venues to create a sprawling, seven-day Chicago Jazz Festival Week, starting Monday.
The boldest experiment begins Thursday, when--for the first time--the “official" opening night of the Chicago Jazz Festival will unfold not in Symphony Center (where it has occurred in recent years), nor in Grant Park's acoustically challenged, aesthetically inferior Petrillo Music Shell.
Instead, the 30th anniversary opener will move up to the superb Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park, where Rollins will play a free, evening-length concert. For those who long have yearned for the Chicago Jazz Festival to evolve beyond the ramshackle environment and dubious production values of the Petrillo Music Shell, the one-night switch to Millennium Park comes as a breath of badly needed fresh air.
For more information contact All About Jazz.
