by Fflannery Cashill
The Wild Magnolias will perform at this year's Blues & Jazz Festival.
The Kansas City Blues and Jazz Festival, the Midwest's favorite, returns to the Liberty Memorial in Penn Valley Park, 27th and Main, for its eleventh year this July 20-22. Voted Kansas City's best festival by Ingram's readers, this year's festival is expected to attract over 50,000 attendees, including visitors from as far away as Japan, Germany, Belgium, and places beyond. Uniting jazz, blues, and most importantly, people, the Blues and Jazz Festival resurrects the Kansas City of yesteryear while promoting a vision of tomorrow.
The festival is known for its line up of both new and classic talents, covering everything from the soulful psalms of gospel to the southern stylings of zydeco. Past festivals have included the likes of Etta James, Al Green, Wilson Pickett, Brian Setzer and Johnny Lang.
This year's festival promises to continue that tradition with three stages of jazz and blues talent, featuring Arturo Sandoval, the Mingus Big Band, Little Feat, Elvin Bishop, Irma Thomas, Jay McShann, Claude "Fiddler" Williams, Myra Taylor, Bobby Watson, Koko Taylor, Jimmy McGriff, Karrin Allyson, Double Trouble (of Stevie Ray Vaughan fame), W.C. Clark, Jimmy D. Lane with Lazy Lester and Harry Hypolite, Rick DellaRatta Trio with Jazz Greats Rufus Reid & Lenny White, Wild Magnolias, Eddy "The Chief" Clearwater, and Jerry Ricks among others. Along with the marquee stars of jazz and blues, the festival also introduces a fresh new crop of talent, from local high school bands to international up and comers.
There's more still. To promote its theme of 'Roots and Rhythm," the 2001 Blues and Jazz festival introduces to its ever-expanding audience a new selection of features, exhibits, and highlights.
The "Soul School", started in 1998 and now a staple of the festival, offers patrons a chance not only to hear, but also to experience the music through workshops, instructions, presentations, and question and answer sessions with jazz and blues legends. Presenters include Irma Thomas, Arturo Sandoval, Jerry Ricks, and Big John Patton. These greats bring their wisdom to interested musicians and music lovers, stressing not so much the mechanics as the spirit and style of performance, the kind experienced by the legends and veterans of blues and jazz.
This year's "Soul School" even features a "Musical Instrument Petting Zoo" for the young, young at heart, and generally uncoordinated, with area students demonstrating the basics to first-time musicians.
Other features include an artist autograph booth, rain tent, free shuttle service, and ice cream social. Food, drink, seating, and yes, even air conditioning will be provided by the festival. The donation of a musical instrument valued at fifty dollars or more entitles you to a free pair of festival passes and a tax-deductible receipt. Tickets are available beforehand at the Kansas City Blues and Jazz Festival website ($25.00 for a weekend pass, $10.00 for a day pass) or at Texaco Star Market locations in the Kansas City metro area. Daily VIP passes are available at $100 a piece and include three free drinks, free parking, up close and personal seating, and a free visit to a buffet line serving everything from Kansas City style barbecue to alligator tails.
Children ten and under are free when accompanied by a paying adult. For more information, call 1.800.530.KCMO or visit the festival's website at www.kcbluesjazz.org. Proceeds go to over a dozen not for profit groups.
Once again, the festival looks like a great way to do something good for your community and to sample the kind of music that you're not going to find a whole lot of in Branson.