The project, entitled Birds: Kids to Newport, has been made possible because of the generosity of George Wein, Jamie Aebersold, private supporters and the Jazz is a Rainbow organization, a project based upon the fact the jazz audiences are graying, jazz institutions such as the IAJE are disappearing and young students in Providence not only had never BEEN to the Newport Jazz Festival: They had never even HEARD of it!
Hence, accompanied by jazz luminaries such as Eric Jackson of WGBH in Boston, Paul Broadnax of the Broadnax Family Scholarship Fund and Providence community leaders, the Birds: Kids to Newport bus will board at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium parking lot at 83 Park Street at 11:00 AM on Saturday, August 8th, THE VERY FIRST TIME SUCH A PROJECT AS THIS HAS BEEN SPONSORED by the jazz festival!
As many in the jazz community are fully aware, this bus represents a modest symbol of the new hope for the survival and rebirth of jazz and jazz audiences in America. These artists fully understand that all the jazz festivals in the world will not save jazz if younger audiences remain unexposed to this music and its creators.
Our previous work, mostly with under served children of color in Rhode Island, Massachusetts and New York has been supported by a diverse group of jazz artists and educators, community, church, educational and political leaders. This has been, for many years, a labor of love.
For more information contact All About Jazz.
