Jazz in Colombia

Today Colombia hosts a number of jazz festivals. Jazz al Parque is a free festival, hosted in Bogotá’s Simón Bolívar Park since 1995. There are also festivals dedicated to other genres organised by the mayor’s office: ‘Rock al Parque’, ‘Salsa al Parque’, etc. Medellín has hosted a jazz festival for nearly as long. Cities like Ibagué in the Andes, the coastal city of Cartagena, and the historic town of Mompox have all hosted jazz festivals in recent years. The 1970s and 80s had been challenging times for those interested in international cultural strands, as the rise in prominence of the drug cartels, rendered tourism and visits from international performers rare.

A key figure in promoting jazz for many decades, against the odds in Colombia, was writer Carlos Flores Sierra (1925-2016), who hosted the TV series ‘Jazz Studio’ for many years, as well as several radio series, founded a short lived magazine, and perhaps most importantly, promoted jazz concerts by local musicians, as well as international figures like Ron Carter, Charlie Haden, Nana Vasconcelos, Arturo Sandoval, Toshiko Akiyoshi and Lew Tabackin.

Another, more recent, proselytiser for Colombian jazz, since he graduated from Berklee College of Music in 1983, has been the pianist, writer and educator, Oscar Acevedo. Another Berklee graduate, bassist Juan Garcia-Herreros has worked in a number of different genres, but has picked up several jazz awards on the way, and includes Terri Lyne Carrington, Lew Soloff and James Spaulding among those he has worked with. Yet another Berklee graduate, saxophonist Antonio Arnedo has worked with John Hollenbeck, Ben Monder, Gonzalo Rubalcaba and Hermeto Pascoal, as well as organising a Colectivo Colombia in an effort to promote collaboration across genres. Arnedo has also been an active teacher, and mentored composer/arranger Eliana Echeverry, who leads the Etcétera Big Band, which blends jazz with Colombian folk traditions. Pianist and arranger Joe Madrid, who worked with Woody Herman, Stan Kenton, Aretha Franklin and Mongo Santamaria, also brought jazz elements into his arrangements for one of Colombia’s leading traditional bands, the Lucho Bermudez Orchestra, which specialised in cumbia and porro. Madrid settled back in Colombia in the 1990s, and was an active educator.

THIS IS A WORK IN PROGRESS – MORE TO COME..