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Today, young and experienced musicians from Cuba will unite their instruments to create melodies and celebrate International Jazz Day with the particular rhythmic quality that characterizes it.
In the city of Matanzas, the party reaches its peak, reserving great concerts with the aim of hosting the V Festival of the Athens of Cuba, dedicated to the musical genre born in the United States at the end of the 19th century.
Ruy López-Nussa and The Academy; Emilio Vega and his group step forward; to the trumpet teacher Roberto García. bassist Rafael Balceiro, trumpeter Maykel González, Afrocuba, the Mestizaje Trio and pianist Alejandro Falcón are some of the participants.
Alongside this jazz event, which will continue until tomorrow, the National Center for Popular Music in the capital organized a tribute to the date with the renowned guitarists Emilio Hernández and Héctor Quintana.
The National Museum of Fine Arts is the chosen setting for the concert featuring two renowned cultists and promoters of Cuban music in the world.
International Jazz Day was proclaimed in 2011 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization with the aim of promoting its virtues as an educational tool, as a means of peace, unity, dialogue and enhanced cooperation among peoples.»
This year, the cultural institution dedicates the day to jazz women in Africa with a concert that will be broadcast online thanks to the collaboration with the European Broadcasting Union.
The idea is to amplify the voice of creators and send a message of dialogue and freedom to encourage respect for shared values and make the public aware of the value and importance of the music genre.
In 2021, the festival honored Namibian jazz, for which the film Skymaster-Township Jazz from the Old Location was screened and the recital was performed by the band The Ugly Creatures, one of the country’s oldest jazz exponents.
Jazz. (taken from Ecured)
It is a style of music that was born in the United States in the early 20th century and that in its origins was an art exclusive to the black community. Jazz is as closely associated with the United States as flamenco is with Spain or rancheras with Mexico. It is certainly the most characteristic cultural expression of this North American country.
The harmony and rhythms of jazz are something very special. From the beginning, jazz musicians knew how to give their creations a personal character that differentiates them from other styles of music.
It’s a style that gives performers great freedom, but at the same time requires a deep knowledge of music and a lot of originality to develop it.
Since its beginnings, jazz has had many different branches, such as blues, which descends directly from the songs of black slaves brought to the United States, boogie-woogie or ragtime, among others.
The typical instruments of jazz are the piano, the double bass, the drums and the wind instruments: in particular the clarinet, the trumpet, the saxophone and the slide trombone.
The guitar, especially the electric and acoustic ones, has also played an important role and over time other instruments have joined this style, such as the violin or some electronic instruments.
The voice is another very important element of jazz, so singers have been some of the great historical figures of this art. Just think of Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holliday or the singer, but also a great trumpeter, Louis Armstrong.
The big bands are the jazz orchestras. They developed throughout the 20th century and used to have a star, either a singer or an instrumentalist, who gave the band its name. They consisted of the instruments mentioned above, but in large numbers.