The Monterey Jazz Festival Summer Jazz Camp is an intensive immersion program for young jazz students to learn and develop music skills and knowledge, with classes including big bands, small ensembles, vocal performance, instrumental master classes, and daily workshops on different music subjects. The camp also includes special sessions for students to attend combo rehearsals and theory classes. Camp staff expect total enrollment of 150 young musicians to participate in this valuable music endeavor, keeping classes and ensembles to a small size. The students, ranging in age from twelve to eighteen years old, earn two units of credit from Monterey Peninsula College at the completion of camp.
Students will have the opportunity to show off their newly-honed skills in recital performances for fans, friends, and family with free performances by hand-selected combos at the Monterey Peninsula College Auditorium, and the Vocal Ensembles and Big Band Concert at the Pacific Grove Middle School Auditorium.
“In my opinion, this is the best two weeks of the summer," said Dr. Rob Klevan, Education Director of the Monterey Jazz Festival. “Without other distractions that occur in the school year, everyone at Camp can focus on improving his or her musical skills in a fun and relaxed atmosphere. The energy at the Summer Jazz Camp is high, and the whole vibe is exciting. And, in addition to our outstanding staff of musicians and jazz educators we will be joined by another of our world-famous alumni, saxophonist Joshua Redman. I can't wait."
The Student Jam Session will take place at the Red Snapper Restaurant at 30 Fisherman's Wharf on Monday, June 20, at 6 pm, with an additional Vocal Mic Night on Tuesday, June 21, at 6 pm, also at the Red Snapper Restaurant. The Combos Concert will take place Wednesday, June 22, at 7 pm at the Monterey Peninsula College Auditorium, with the Vocal and Big Band Concert taking place on Thursday, June 23 at 7 pm at the Pacific Grove Middle School Auditorium in Pacific Grove.
This year's Summer Jazz Camp will be highlighted by the presence of the Monterey Jazz Festival's 2011 Artist-In-Residence, Joshua Redman, one of the most acclaimed and charismatic jazz artists to have emerged in the decade of the 1990s. Born in Berkeley, California, he is the son of legendary saxophonist Dewey Redman and dancer Renee Shedroff. He began playing clarinet at age nine before switching to the tenor saxophone, at age ten. Attending Berkeley High School, he performed at the Monterey Jazz Festival in 1985 as a member of the Berkeley High School Big Band and as a member of the Festival's California High School All-Star Big Band in 1986. Redman issued his self-titled first album in 1993, which subsequently earned Redman his first of two GRAMMY nominations. From 2000-2007, Redman was the Artistic Director for the Spring Season for SFJAZZ and acted as the leader of the SFJAZZ Collective beginning in 2004. In recent years, Joshua has been performing with James Farm featuring Aaron Parks, Matt Penman, and Eric Harland, who will be one of the headliners of the 54th Monterey Jazz Festival in September.
In addition to Mr. Redman, the camp's roster of instructors continues to feature many of the finest jazz educators in the country. 2011 faculty include saxophonists Paul Contos, Paul Lucckesi, and Virginia Mayhew, trumpeters Peck Allmond and Michael Galisatus, trombonist Robynn Amy, drummer Vince Lateano, bassist Scott Steed, guitarist Bruce Forman, pianists Milton Fletcher and Eddie Mendenhall and renowned vocalists Julia Dollison and Kerry Marsh. Committed to training young instructors in the art of teaching, the camp also invites talented alumni of the Festival's Jazz Education Programs to mentor younger students. In 2011, the Summer Jazz Camp welcomes back trombonist Mark Stotzer, drummer Jesus Vega, violinist Noah Freedman, bassist Ryan Grech, and guitarist Tim Fischer to its faculty.
Reservations for the Monterey Jazz Festival Summer Jazz Camp can be made by contacting Dr. Rob Klevan at the Festival offices at 831.373.3366 or [email protected].
Major support for the 2011 Summer Jazz Camp comes from the AT&T Foundation, Nancy Buck Ransom Foundation, Robert & Audrey Talbott Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional contributions come from the William McCaskey Chapman & Adaline Dinsmore Chapman Foundation, D'Addario Music Foundation, Dunspaugh-Dalton Foundation, Monterey Peninsula Foundation, Pebble Beach Company Foundation, Quest Foundation, and generous individuals.
The Monterey Jazz Festival is dedicated to perpetuating the uniquely American form of music known as jazz by producing performances that celebrate the legacy and expand the boundaries of jazz; and by presenting year-round local, regional, national, and international jazz education programs. The Monterey Jazz Festival is a nonprofit organization and has donated its proceeds to musical education since its inception in 1958.
