Jazz fest club shows roarin’ and soarin’, definitely not boring

A rap and New Orleans jazz mashup, a show where 1920s style meets 2020s vibes and tributes to four musical innovators will have the city swinging during the Winnipeg International Jazz Festival.

Two of the city’s most popular live acts, the Dirty Catfish Brass Band and the Lytics, will join forces to launch the festival’s 35th season June 14 at the Pyramid Cabaret in a fascinating fusion of horns and hip-hop.

“They approached us with this show. They have been collaborating behind the scenes,” says Zachary Rushing, Jazz Winnipeg’s program manager.

“I’m certainly curious (to see) how it shakes out. We’ve booked it entirely on the strength of both of these groups as independent artists, so the collaboration will be revealed to me at the same time as it is everyone else, which is very exciting.”

The Pyramid will also host another outside-the-box combo the following night.

Dubbed Roaring 2020s, the event is a co-production with Memetic, the Manitoba Electronic Music Festival, which held similar shows prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rushing foresees fans partying like it’s the 1920s while grooving to dance music from a century later, provided by city DJs Lotek, Manalogue, Komus, Pixel Pusher and Nathan Zahn.

“People get dressed up to the nines in their Gatsby-inspired outfits and are treated to an eclectic experience of jazz-influenced house and funk and dance music all night,” he says.

Four musical titans who died in 2023 — Jeff Beck, Astrud Gilberto, Burt Bacharach and Tony Bennett — will be fêted with tribute concerts held at the Fort Garry Hotel’s Club Room.

Winnipeg group Ego Spank takes on Beck’s songs and innovative guitar solos (June 16); the Nova Brasil Collective will team up with the Sadler Sisters to perform Gilberto’s The Girl From Ipanema and other works (June 17); vocalist Jennifer Hanson will perform songs from Bacharach’s vast songbook (June 18); and singer Nadia Douglas will have the club room swooning with Bennett’s famous tunes, such as I Left My Heart in San Francisco (June 19).

The tribute shows are similar to the Spirit of ‘73 concerts from the 2023 festival, which proved popular. Ego Spank bassist Gilles Fournier brought the Beck proposal to Jazz Winnipeg, and the series grew from there.

“I really love being able to hand a creative project to a local artist. It’s always really exciting to see a special project, something that may only exist once in the world,” Rushing says

Six acts will be part of the Canadian Jazz Showcase, which will take over the Royal Albert Arms. Winnipeg’s Mundane Problems and Edmonton trombonist Audrey Ochoa play June 20, Latin jazz artists Eliana Cuevas and Jeremy Ledbetter play June 21, followed by Juno Award winners Avataar and on June 22, two Montreal artists — Bellbird and Cuban-Canadian pianist Hilario Durán — close out the festival’s final evening.

The latest jazz-fest details dovetail with the event’s headliners announced in March, which will have the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, a group with six decades of New Orleans tradition behind it, and American vocalist Veronica Swift performing at the Burton Cummings Theatre June 20 and 22, respectively.

Three other acts that cater to contemporary jazz fans will perform at Knox United Church (400 Edmonton St.): Isaiah Collier and the Chosen Few (June 14); pianist Benny Green (June 15); and the Pasquale Grasso Trio (June 17).

Swift’s concert is tops on Rushing’s radar; her self-titled 2023 album mixes jazz, classical, vaudeville and rock, and pays homage to Duke Ellington, Beethoven, Janis Joplin and Nine Inch Nails, among others.

“She is a young woman who has one finger in every musical pot and is exploring all of that,” he says. “Anyone who loves good singing is going to find that show incredibly thrilling.”

Alan.Small@winnipegfreepress.com

X: @AlanDSmall