Jazz at Lincoln Center Launches the 2005-06 Season With the Kansas City Festival

Jazz at Lincoln Center Launches the 2005-06 Season With the Kansas City Festival

Celebrating the Jazz Tradition and Culture of 'The Heart of America' September 22-25

- Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis

- Bobby Watson's Boogie-Woogie Jump Band

- Charles McPherson at Jazz Standard

- Basie, Blues & Beyond: Karrin Allyson, Nancy King & Friends

- Jazz 101 Classes

- FREE Jazz Battles

- KC Food Tastings

- Exclusive Book Signings

- LIVE Radio Broadcast of Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra Concert on WBGO Jazz88.3FM, KCUR-FM in Kansas City and XM Satellite Radio

NEW YORK, Aug. 3 /PRNewswire/ -- Jazz at Lincoln Center launches the Jazz From Coast to Coast 2005-06 season with the Kansas City Festival from September 22 to 25 at Frederick P. Rose Hall in New York City, surrounding the three days with all things unique to Kansas City: rich jazz tradition, the blues legacy and Kansas City-style barbecue. The not-for-profit organization devoted to jazz announced the Kansas City Festival schedule of events taking place in each of the main spaces at the performance arts facility located at Broadway at 60th St. and at Jazz Standard located at 116 E. 27th St. in New York City.

The festival kicks off with Kansas City: K.C. and The Count concerts featuring the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis and special guest saxophonist and flutist Frank Wess in Rose Theater on September 22, 23 and 24 at 8:00 pm. Tickets are $30, $50, $75, $100, $130 and available at the Jazz at Lincoln Center box office on Broadway at 60th St., by calling CenterCharge at (212) 721-6500 or via http://www.jalc.org/.

Kansas City: K.C. and The Count featuring the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra will be broadcast live on September 24 via radio partners WBGO Jazz88.3FM in the New York City area at 8 pm ET and KCUR-FM in Kansas City at 7 pm CT. XM Satellite Radio listeners nationwide will also hear the concert broadcast on select XM channels.

Bobby Watson's Boogie-Woogie Jump Band and the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra perform in The Allen Room on September 22, 23 and 24 at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $40, $75, $130 and available at the Jazz at Lincoln Center box office on Broadway at 60th St., by calling CenterCharge at (212) 721-6500 or via http://www.jalc.org/.

The Jazz 101 "Kansas City is Swing Territory" class, led by Loren Schoenberg, Executive Director of the Harlem Jazz Museum, is also part of the festival. The class takes place in the Edward John Noble Foundation Studio on Wednesdays from September 21-November 8, 2005, from 6:30 - 8:30 pm. The eight-class session is $240.00.

In the Atrium, Jazz at Lincoln Center hosts events to introduce jazz lovers to the rich traditions, mouth-watering cuisine and libations of Kansas City.

"We are thrilled that Kansas City's history and contribution to jazz are being recognized by Jazz at Lincoln Center," said Mayor Kay Barnes, Mayor of the City of Kansas City, Missouri. "Kansas Citizens are very proud of our Jazz heritage, which is rooted in our historic 18th & Vine Jazz District, and we're honored that it is being highlighted at this exciting event. Greats such as Charlie Parker and Count Basie nurtured their talents on the streets of Kansas City, and today we celebrate their accomplishments throughout our community. I encourage jazz fans visiting the Kansas City Festival at Jazz at Lincoln Center to make plans to visit to Kansas City for a real taste of our authentic jazz history."

The complete schedule of Kansas City Festival events:

* Kansas City: K.C. and The Count
Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis Featuring guest
artists Frank Wess
Thursday-Saturday, September 22, 23 & 24, 2005, Rose Theater, 8 pm
The Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis performs the
music of influential Kansas City jazz musicians, particularly the
legendary Count Basie and his spare signature piano style. Saxophonist
FRANK WESS, who played in Count Basie's big band, joins the orchestra
to play some of the best of Kansas City's boogie-woogie jazz. This
special Kansas City show integrates new talent inspired by rich
tradition.
Tickets: $30, $50, $75, $100, $130

* Kansas City: K.C. Boogie-Woogie
Bobby Watson's Boogie-Woogie Jump Band and the Juilliard Jazz Orchestra
Thursday-Saturday, September 22, 23 & 24, 2005, The Allen Room, 7:30 pm
Saxophonist and bandleader BOBBY WATSON and the Juilliard jazz
orchestra (celebrating its centennial) come together to perform some of
the best of Kansas City's boogie-woogie jazz. Bobby Watson's Boogie-
Woogie Jump Band brings these swingin' sounds and this distinctive
Kansas City style -- famed for its percussive piano sound - to The
Allen Room.
Tickets: $40, $75, $130

* Jazz 101: Kansas City: Swing Territory with Loren Schoenberg, Executive
Director of the Harlem Jazz Museum and Grammy Winning Writer
Wednesdays from September 21-November 8, 2005, Edward John Noble
Foundation Studio, 6:30 - 8:30 pm
Take a trip to Kansas City without ever leaving Frederick P. Rose Hall.
This class will provide insight to the first city celebrated in Jazz at
Lincoln Center's season "Jazz from Coast to Coast" and the musicians
that were responsible for the unique Kansas City sound.
Registration fee: $240

* Basie, Blues & Beyond: Karrin Allyson, Nancy King & Friends
September 22, 2005, Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola, 7:30 pm and 9:30 pm
As part of the Diet Coke Women in Jazz Festival, Kansas City native
Karrin Allyson join other spectacular women onstage during this
celebration of the great contributions women performers have made to
jazz music.
$30 cover charge.

* Smokestack Lightning Adventures in the Heart of Barbecue Country by
Lolis Eric Elie Photographs by Frank Stewart Book Signing by Frank
Stewart
Thursday, Sept. 22, 2005, Atrium, 6 pm
Photographer Frank Stewart signs copies of this book on restaurants and
barbecue joints around the country, stirred together with legends and
bits and pieces of barbecue history.

* Celebrating Bird and Kansas City Jazz with Charles McPherson
Friday-Sunday, September 23 -25, 2005, Jazz Standard at 116 E. 27th
St., NY, New York, 7:30 pm and 9:30 pm, with an additional 11:30 pm set
on Friday and Saturday. In conjunction with Jazz at Lincoln Center's
Kansas City Festival, Jazz Standard presents veteran alto saxophonist
Charles McPherson in four gala evenings dedicated to one of the city's
most legendary jazz scions. Born August 29, 1920 in Kansas City,
Charlie "Yardbird" Parker found his first professional gig there in
1937, when he joined pianist Jay McShann's band on alto sax ... and the
rest, as they say, is jazz history.
Music Charge: $30 Friday & Saturday / $25 Sunday
Tickets can be purchased at http://www.ticketweb.com/ or by calling Jazz
Standard at 212-576-2232.

* Jazz Battle
Featuring guest jazz musicians
Saturday, September 24, Dizzy's Club Coca-Cola, 1 pm, 2 pm and 3 pm
Free to the public and to jazz lovers of all ages, this battle features
some of today's top jazz soloists, duking it out in the hottest jazz
club in the city.
Admission is free and on a first come, first served basis.

* Valaida by Candace Allen Book Signing
Saturday, September 24, Border's at the Time Warner Center at Columbus
Circle, 2 pm
Author Candace Allen will be on hand to sign her first novel, Valaida,
an exploration of '40s trumpeter Valaida Snow, her work, and the taboos
associated with women playing trumpets.

* Kansas City Jazz: From Ragtime to Bebop A History By Frank Driggs and
Chuck Haddix Book Signing by Frank Driggs
TBA
Frank Driggs and Chuck Haddix signs copies of their book that tell all
the tales of an under-appreciated scene. The authors capture the spirit
and soul of the golden age of Kansas City jazz, from ragtime to bebop
and from Bennie Moten to Charlie Parker.

About jazz in Kansas City:

Jazz in Kansas City was born in the 1920s and continues today in clubs and events held throughout the city. The roots of Kansas City jazz are quite varied. Blues singers of the 1920s and ragtime music greatly influenced the music scene. Settings such as dance halls, cabarets and speakeasies fostered the development of this new musical style. In the early days, many jazz groups were smaller dance bands with three to six pieces. By the mid-1920s, the big band became the most common. While jazz began in the 1920s with a bang, it flourished in the 1930s, mainly as a result of political boss Tom Pendergast. During prohibition, he allowed alcohol to flow in Kansas City. As an entertainment center, Kansas City had no equal during these dry times. This "wide-open" town image attracted displaced musicians from everywhere in mid- America. Throughout the Depression, Kansas City bands continued to play while other bands across the nation folded. The city was shielded from the worst of the Depression due to an early form of New Deal-style public works projects that provided jobs, and affluence, that kept the dance-oriented nightlife in town swinging. Only in Kansas City did jazz continue to flourish. At one time, there were more than 100 night clubs, dance halls and vaudeville houses in Kansas City regularly featuring jazz music. Legends like Count Basie, Andy Kirk, Joe Turner, Hot Lips Page and Jay McShann all played in Kansas City. A saxophone player named Charlie Parker began his ascent to fame here in his hometown in the 1930s. In the history of Kansas City music, blues formed the basic vocabulary for KC-style jazz. The blues originated as a rural Black vocal music with a style improvised to the rhythms of work. That early rhythm evolved and gave birth to the blues, and eventually to Kansas City jazz, a kind of blues that jumps with a jazz sound.

Jazz at Lincoln Center is a not-for-profit arts organization dedicated to jazz. With the world-renowned Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, the Afro-Latin Jazz Orchestra and a comprehensive array of guest artists, Jazz at Lincoln Center advances a unique vision for the continued development of the art of jazz by producing a year-round schedule of performance, education, and broadcast events for audiences of all ages. These productions include concerts, national and international tours, residencies, weekly national radio and television programs, recordings, publications, an annual high school jazz band competition and festival, a band director academy, a jazz appreciation curriculum for children, advanced training through the Juilliard Institute for Jazz Studies, music publishing, children's concerts, lectures, adult education courses and student and educator workshops. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis, Chairman of the Board Lisa Schiff, President & CEO Derek E. Gordon, Executive Director Katherine E. Brown and Jazz at Lincoln Center board and staff, Jazz at Lincoln Center will produce hundreds of events during its 2005-06 season. In October 2004, Jazz at Lincoln Center opened Frederick P. Rose Hall - the first-ever performance, education, and broadcast facility devoted to jazz. For more information, visit http://www.jalc.org/.

Jazz at Lincoln Center proudly acknowledges its 2005-2006 partners: Altria Group, Bank of America, Bloomberg, The Coca-Cola Company, Samsung Electronics America, Inc., Time Warner Inc., XM Satellite Radio.

Brooks Brothers is the official clothier of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis.

BET Jazz is proud to partner with Jazz at Lincoln Center to present the television series Journey with Jazz at Lincoln Center.

Source: Jazz at Lincoln Center

CONTACT: For Wynton Marsalis: Zooey Tidal, Assistant Director of Public
Relations, +1-212-258-9821, ztidal@jalc.org; or For Bobby Watson's: Scott H.
Thompson, Assistant Director of Public Relations, +1-212-258-9807,
sthompson@jalc.org

Web site: http://www.jalc.org/
http://www.ticketweb.com/

NOTE TO EDITOR: High resolution, downloadable photos available: For the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra with Wynton Marslis, go to: http://www.jalc.org/presenters/images/index.html For Bobby Watson's Boogie-Woogie Jump Band, go to: ftp://ftp.jazzatlincolncenter.org/press/images/006/06_bobby_watson.jpg

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