Photo Courtesy of Dorothy Mangold | Ben Harris from Jazz In Bloom 2015
We may be in the midst of April showers, but that also means two other things: the Botanical Garden of the Ozarks is blooming up a storm and it’s jazz appreciation month.
The gorgeous scenery of the Botanical Gardens of the Ozarks will soon be the backdrop to the lovely sounds of the annual Jazz In Bloom event Sunday, April 24, at 3 p.m. Hosted by the Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society, the evening includes catered food, libations and live jazz from the nine-piece Fayetteville Jazz Collective.
Tickets to the event are $40 for non-members and $25 for members of the Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society. Memberships for students are $10, and $20 for individuals and $30 for a family, and Jazz In Bloom tickets are sold separately at the discounted price. Memberships and tickets to the event can be bought online at digjazz.com.
The concert’s proceeds will go to benefit the Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society and its jazz initiative in collaboration with the Walton Arts Center to recruit young school students to learn the jazz craft. The Fayetteville Jazz Collective has been playing concerts at schools throughout the area to demonstrate the trajectory of jazz music in America throughout the past 100 years.
Photo Courtesy of Dorothy Mangold | Claudia Burson of the Fayetteville Jazz Collective from Jazz In Bloom 2015.
“The school programs we are doing over the next six months will lead to recruiting, auditioning and developing a Jazz Youth Orchestra that will have a home, hopefully at the Walton Arts Center,” said Robert Ginsberg, the NWAJS executive director. “It’s a very ambitious undertaking as you can imagine.”
One of the sets played at the Jazz in Bloom concert will be the program that’s played to the students at the recruitment concerts at the schools. In order to appeal to the nature of their young audiences, the program features a jazz arraignment of The Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” and introduces several classic tunes to demonstrate rhythm and improvisational elements found in jazz.
“When you’re trying to get the attention of kids in high school, there’s only two things they’re concerned about; hormones and themselves,” Ginsberg said. “So we frame the music around self-expression and the individual among the group. That’s what this music is about, democracy.”
Photo Courtesy of Dorothy Mangold From Jazz In Bloom 2015
Ginsberg was recently awarded the “Jazz Hero” award from the national Jazz Journalists Association, who determined Ginsberg “demonstrates the prominence of women and Americans of diverse ethnic backgrounds in support of jazz.” Ginsberg was selected alongside 22 other “Jazz Heroes” nationwide. An awards ceremony is in the works, he said.
Jazz In Bloom: Hosted by Northwest Arkansas Jazz Society
Who: Fayetteville Jazz Collective
Where: Botanical Garden of the Ozarks, 4703 N. Crossover Rd. Springdale, Ark. 72764
When: Sunday, April 24 at 3 p.m.
How Much: Non-members $40, Members $25
