30th Jazz Plaza Festival kicks off in Havana

By: Yeneily Gracía García

Having distinguished guests as it should be, the 30th Jazz Plaza International Festival started in Havana on Wednesday. During five days this festival will heat up the temperature of musical creation in the city and will turn Havana into the capital of jazz.

The opening concert of the event—scheduled until December 21—was in charge of the National Music Award and showman Bobby Carcassés and his son, Robertico, who invited to the stage of Teatro Mella—one of the 20 venues of the festival—musicians like Rolando Luna, the Magic Sax Quartet, from Santiago de Cuba province, and Zenaida Romeu and her Camerata, who performed Caravana in tempo rumbero with the U.S. flutist Andrea Brachfeld.

This performance was enough to bring the audience to its feet, an audience that also applauded the reference to the historic events of the day where the diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States were reestablished after 53 years and the return of Gerardo Hernández, Antonio Guerrero and Ramón Labañino, the three Cuban Heroes that were still imprisoned in US jails.

During the show the XXX aniversario distinctions were also granted to institutions, groups and personalities that have enhanced the Jazz Plaza previous editions, a festival that started in 1980 in Casa de la Cultura in Plaza municipality in Havana, and that has become the most important event of the genre in the country.

During the opening night some other venues also opened its doors; that’s the case of the Teatro Mella´s Gardens, Raquel Revuelta Cultural Center and Casa de la Cultura in Plaza Municipality, with the performance of Isaac Delgado and his group, among others.

The 10th Jazz International Colloquium also started at Pabellon Cuba that brings for today book presentations, panels and conferences with topics like the Aesthetic challenges in the audiovisual world in jazz in Cuba with the participation of Mario Masvidal, Tony Pinelli, Joseph Ross, and Raúl Valdés Gonzáles (Raupa).

Source: Cubarte