By Tim Reinert
It’s time to talk about Jazz. Now, it might feel a little reductive to call out the fact that I’m going to talk about Jazz in my first article about this year’s Vancouver International Jazz Festival. I mean…it’s an article about a Jazz festival…it’s a given that I’m going to talk about Jazz, isn’t it? But every year’s line up seems to invite a whole new round of debate on what, exactly, is Jazz? And why aren’t my favourite Jazz musicians playing this year? And why is that famous rapper headlining a Jazz festival?
The answers to these questions are complicated, as you knew they would be. Jazz evolves all the time. It’s supposed to. What we considered “Jazz” in 1925 when Louis Armstrong started to record his Hot Fives & Sevens is wildly different from the bebop that Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie created on 52nd street in the mid 1940s, and the innovations of Miles Davis and John Coltrane 15-20 years later were more dissimilar still. With this music, the journey is the point. And to look at the schedule of this year’s Jazz Festival is to look at a map of a genre…lots of different places to go, and they all connect. Kind of.
With all of that being a caveat of sorts, this year’s Jazz Festival has a LOT of Jazz of the more mainstream variety. As the legendary drummer Joe Farnsworth would say ‘It’s Time to Swing.”
Ulysses Owens Jr & Generation Y
Drummer Ulysses Owens Jr recently went “viral,” as the kids say, with a video of him listening to the rock band Nirvana for the first time. The video worked on a lot of levels, mostly due to how much of an evangelist for Jazz Owens is. On his new album for Cellar Live, Owens plays the Art Blakey role to a tee, acting as a sort of slightly elder statesman (he’s only a decade older than most of the band). For his Vancouver show at Performance Works, he’s leading a quintet of Generations Y’s heaviest hitters, including trumpet megastar in the making, Benny Benack III.
June 28, 7:30PM
Performance Works
Tickets are $37 plus fees
Lakecia Benjamin & Phoenix
She’s won a bunch of “Up & Coming” and “Rising Star” awards for her work on the alto saxophone, but Lakecia Benjamin “arrived” on the scene a long time ago…it’s just that the scene is finally catching up with her. While John Coltrane is an obvious touchpoint when discussing her aesthetic (a song on her latest album is named after the tenor giant), her sound is so much more than one player, encompassing literal decades of Jazz development. She’s put together a great band for her Performance Works show, including EJ Strickland on the drums, not seen on a Vancouver stage in over five years.
June 27, 7:30PM
Performance Works
Tickets are $37 plus fees
Veronica Swift
A good way to figure out who people will get excited about at any given Jazz Festival, is to ask Vincent Lim. Lim is a Vancouver-based photographer known for his work in the city’s Jazz community, and for going to hundreds of Jazz concerts every year. That’s not a typo, it’s literally hundreds. And when I asked him who he was excited about this year, it took barely a second for him to start talking about singer Veronica Swift. Swift has earned Lim’s respect the old-fashioned way: She’s earned it. From recording with Richie Cole at the age of 9, to tours with Wynton Marsalis and Benny Green, Swift has won pretty much every accolade and honour a Jazz singer can earn in 2024, and still be considered a true Jazz singer. She’ll be one of the headliners at this year’s Jazz Festival.
June 24, 7:30PM
Vancouver Playhouse
Tickets are $40 – $60 plus fees
The Jason Winikoff Hot Five
Drummer Jason Winikoff moved from New Orleans to Vancouver in 2018, and quickly earned a rep as one of the city’s foremost experts on pretty much every kind of music you can think of. He’s been at the centre of concerts featuring Zambian and Iranian music, not to mention a full-scale reproduction of the music of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. But the music that’s arguably closest to his heart, is the music of New Orleans. Specifically, the “traditional” music from 1900-1930 that helped birth what we now consider to be American Jazz. If you’re one of those people who is always asking “where the REAL Jazz is” at the Jazz Festival every year, Winikoff is the answer to your question.
June 22, 12:30PM
Downtown Jazz, Georgia Street Stage
Free to attend
Pasquale Grasso with Andre Lachance & Andrew Millar
Guitar phenom Pasquale Grasso was last on a Vancouver stage with Samara Joy in 2022, and audiences here have been chomping at the bit to have him back ever since. He’ll be teaming up with Vancouver’s bass god Andre Lachance and NYC first-call drummer Andrew Millar for what is guaranteed to be a can’t miss show if you love Jazz guitar. There’s a quote from Pat Metheny that’s going around that says that Pasquale Grasso is the best guitarist he’s every heard in his life… and Pat Metheny is no liar.
June 30, 8:30PM
Ocean Artworks
Tickets are $20 at the door
Various Artists – Frankie’s Jazz Club
It’s become a Jazz Festival truism that the best “Straight Ahead” Jazz each year can often be found at Frankie’s Jazz Club. It’s the city’s only full time Jazz venue and offers a wide range of Jazz and Blues live events, year round. This year’s schedule at Frankie’s is particularly stacked, with international stars like Scott Hamilton, Lezlie Harrison, and Tom Wakeling all headlining shows at the club. Vancouver’s talent depths are represented as well, with performances by local heroes Atley King, Sharon Minemoto, Triology (they’ll be playing with Scott Hamilton), Jon Bentley, Bruno Hubert, and Dave Robbins. Plus a special performance by New Oreans guitarist Mike Clement, PLUS special After Dark shows featuring Jesse Cahill (with Chris Gestrin & David Sikula), Tyson Naylor, and Junk Story (with Bernie Arai, Brad Turner, Chad Makela & James Meger).
For more on Tim’s picks, check out this Infidels Jazz podcast episode.
