Director's Letter

It has been a long time since jazz stopped being only a music repertoire and a series of cultural and social events adjacent to that repertoire, located in one place, urban North America, to become a universal language.

We might be overstating it, but we could venture to say that every little village has a certain jazz colour.

Buenos Aires is no exception and, even before that mutation, the city was already an important item on the international jazz agenda, and the local activity has always been sparkling and fruitful.

Today this city –which by virtue of its musician’s talent, hard work and artistic commitment has earned the right of having its own festival– is one of the spots in the globe where it’s possible to find and enjoy the best jazz throughout the entire week.

But what kind of festival do we want? This is not a minor question. It is not enough to celebrate a party testifying to that evolution, a mere tight catalogue of what is going on the rest of the year. The festival should foster the realisation of dreams and promote artistic gatherings, it should be an incentive that somewhat displeases musicians, driving them out of their comfortable place into challenging themselves, taking risks, honing their skills. .

When it comes to creating, safety is not a value to be encouraged. That is our belief.

And every artistic movement which is healthy, vital and young, tests itself when accepting to take aesthetic risks. Out task should not be limited to watching those leaps into the void, but to accompany them, to stimulate them.

We are convinced that the audience will celebrate, appreciate and enrich from these unusual propositions.

And, if once the last lights are off, the festival is only documented on a list that talks about the number of people who attended, that is not enough.

A concrete production must be left as a result. Written music, recordings, books, registers and new musical societies among artist whose encounter they owe to the festival. This is the objective we intend to achieve.

Paradoxically, we have not conceived the festival for the experienced audience, the regular jazz lovers. We know they will be joining us to enjoy their admired artists, as well as others that will be new to them.

We would rather aim at those who approach jazz perhaps for the first time. We ask them to grant us the opportunity to show them that experience in the field is not required to enjoy the magic, joy and wonder of this music.

Because a jazz concert is a ground where things happen in real time, with no second chances, no previous speculations. In short, without a safety net.

We intend to provide the festival with a core, a plot and a concept but, at the same time, we have taken special care to be diverse and pluralistic.

Our hope is that each one of the attendants can identify with some artist or style, or a certain aesthetics in particular. We want to offer different choices for those who like the theatre, the more intimate places, or the open-air stages.

Both tradition and the new tendencies will find their way at the festival: the mature musicians who helped shape this tradition and the younger artists who keep the flame alive. Instrumental music, singers, big groups and soloists. We have invited international musicians who have never before visited our city and have commissioned music which will testify to the encounter that Argentinian jazz proposes with its own mentors, with other coexisting music genres and other artistic disciplines. We also encourage the gathering of local and guest musicians, and offer many activities revolving around music: open lessons, films and documentaries, round tables, debates, photographs.

The intention is to generate a space for our producers, owners of discographic labels, agents and concert organisers to meet with their foreign counterparts, specially invited with the aim of expanding the opportunities to work and do business. In our country and abroad.

We also propose two tributes: to our beloved Walter Malosetti and the also dear Carlos Inzillo and his season Jazzología. This is not accidental. Any artistic avant-garde movement –to claim to be so– which does not lean on the awareness, attention and respect for the traditions which were its base is just an intellectual sport. There is no future ahead of them.

There are still some things pending. Fortunately. Because that attests to our enthusiasm and ambition. Hopefully we will see to them in future editions.

A jazz festival is not just a festival. It’s a jazz festival. It has its own logic and distinctive features. The same logic and distinctive features that characterise Buenos Aires, whatever the cultural or artistic event it hosts. Things never ever happen the same way in Buenos Aires than in the rest of the world. And, at least in this matter, this is great news.

Welcome.

Adrián Iaies,
September de 2008.