Stirling maestros to play for place in SA jazz band
SEVENTY jazz scholars from East London, Grahamstown and Port Elizabeth are practising hard ahead of the six-day 25th Standard Bank National Youth Jazz Festival starting on June 29.
The festival runs alongside the National Arts Festival.
Alan Webster, director of both the overall Standard Bank Jazz Festival, and the youth jazz festival, said the youths would mingle and play with 280 jazz scholars from around South Africa.
Webster said the scholars, aged 14 to 18, play a range of instruments, from piano, drums, guitar, trumpet and trombone, while some are vocalists.
Thirty-five of the 70 Eastern Cape musicians are attending for the first time.
There were also regional auditions to play in the national youth jazz band which is finalised at the jazz festival in Grahamstown.
Thirty Eastern Cape youths auditioned and from this group seven East London scholars were chosen to compete for the national team honours at the festival’s jazz home, the Lilla Strong Hall at Diocesan School for Girls (DSG).
They are Inga Tokwe (saxophone); Eldene Bruiners (trombone); Avante O’Reilly; (trombone); Sonqoba Njengele (drums); Casey van Heerden (voice); Lise Siebert (sax); and Emily Webster (trombone and drums). They are all at Stirling High.
Nationally
All the youthful jazzos attending the festival will hang out with national and international jazz stars, like bass and clarinet star Shannon Mowday and Australian big band jazz 150 youths auditioned. leader James Morrison.
Mowday will also play with them and offer mentoring notes.
Other Eastern Cape scholars taking part are from Hudson and Stirling high schools and Merrifield College, St Andr College and DSG.
Webster said: “We need to see more students playing jazz. The festival in Grahamstown is the ideal opportunity to get together and hear your friends play and see what jazzos from around the world can do.
“Jazz is an extremely educational form. It emphasises teamwork and creativity.
“What is there to stop you from getting together and listening to a lot of jazz and then creating some jazz acapella? Nothing. Kids who get into jazz need to listen to as much of it as possible and find people who will share it with you.”
He said kwaito was an extension of jazz and was popular with many jazz scholars in the province. —