UCT Big Band celebrates International Jazz Day

15 Apr 2024 | By Nomfundo Xaluva-Dyantyis
webtickets_image_uct_big_band_april
15 Apr 2024 | By Nomfundo Xaluva-Dyantyis

The UCT Big Band, under the directorship of Associate Professor Amanda Tiffin will join the global jazz community in commemorating International Jazz Day which falls on the 30th of April, as declared by the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in November 2011. The premise of International Jazz Day is to accentuate the role of jazz music in international diplomacy, diversity, freedom of expression, tolerance, and unity across colour, creed and religious lines. Through this concert, the UCT Big Band will perform repertoire that demonstrates its fierce commitment to diversity, equality, and cultural pride.

The concert will take the audience on a journey through the vast cultural contexts in which jazz enjoys expression. From the traditional American big band repertoire, the band will play music by renowned arrangers who include saxophonist and University of Southern California’s Bob Mintzer, NEA Jazz Masters Award recipient Bill Holman and the Big Phat Band’s Gordon Goodwin. The band will make its way to Brazil by playing a seminal composition from the “father of Bossa Nova” Antonio Carlos Jobim. They will also perform two pieces by visiting Austrian lecture and composer/arranger Markus Gieselhart of Vienna’s MDW University of Music and Performing Arts, who worked extensively with the UCT Big Band during his visit to SACM.

The evening would not be complete without music from South Africa’s finest composers. These include veteran composer, producer, and musical director Ntate Caiphus Semenya whose discography occupies a very central part of our country’s musical identity. Cape Town’s rich and complex history is poignantly captured in the music of anti-apartheid activists and artists like those who formed the membership of the pre-eminent jazz-rock band, Pacific Express. The UCT Big Band will honor these musicians who include but are not limited to Ebrahim Khalil Shihab (Chris Schilder), “Mannenberg” Coetzee, Robbie Jansen, Zayn Adams, Tony Schilder and Jack Momple.

Through this concert, the UCT Big Band considers itself in conversation with other global events marking International Jazz Day, the most prestigious being the UNESCO All Star Global Concert, taking place for the very first time on African soil in Tangier, Morocco. SACM is proud to have two of its esteemed alumni Mandisi Dyantyis and Moreira Chonguica on this illustrious line-up which includes Herbie Hancock, Marcus Miller, DeeDee Bridgewater, and Richard Bona among a list of the world’s top jazz musicians.

As the world grapples with the moral complexities of difference, the UCT Big Band invites the audience to pause and reflect on the transformative and unifying principles of International Jazz Day.

The concert takes place on Tuesday 30 April at 7pm in the Baxter Concert Hall. Tickets are available via Webtickets for R150 (full price), R100 (pensioners 60+), R50 (scholars) and UCT students are offered free entry subject to availability. For further queries please contact SACM Concert Coordinator, Fiona Grayer, on concerts@uct.ac.za