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PEOPLE & ARTS Tuesday 11 april 2017
Havana named as host city for 2017 International Jazz Day

CHARLES J. GANS pianists Gonzalo Rubalca- cluding Valdes’ Irakere
Associated Press ba and Bobby Carcasses that fused modern jazz with
NEW YORK (AP) — Herbie and younger musicians like Afro-Cuban influences.
Hancock has twice before trumpeter Julio Padron and A year earlier, Irakere had
visited Havana to perform pianist Alfredo Rodriguez. become the first Cuban
intimate solo-duet con- “I expect International Jazz jazz band to play in the U.S.
certs with his Cuban coun- Day to be an historic event since Fidel Castro’s rise to
terpart Chucho Valdes, in Cuba. All the Cuban power, performing at the
but at the end of April the musicians are really excit- Newport-New York Jazz
two renowned jazz pianists ed because it’s a dream Festival at Carnegie Hall in
will be collaborating on a come true for many of New York City and record-
grander scale. them,” said Valdes, inter- ing a Grammy-winning
Hancock and Valdes will viewed by phone from his album. Hancock and Val-
be serving as artistic direc- Florida home, with his re- des say the links between
tors for the 6th International marks in Spanish translated American and Cuban mu-
Jazz Day. On Monday, the by his wife. sicians go back nearly a In this Feb. 12, 2017 file photo, Chucho Valdes poses with his
United Nations Education- Valdes called it the “most century to when New Or- Grammy Award for best latin jazz album for “Tribute to Irakere:
Live in Marciac” at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
al, Scientific and Cultural significant” jazz event in leans pianist and composer Associated Press
Organization announced Cuba since the 1979 Ha- Jelly Roll Morton referred to
that Havana will be the vana Jam when CBS Re- the “Spanish tinge” in the his band to create Latin- stitute of Music and Ministry
global host city for the cords brought American new music. The connec- flavored compositions. of Culture, said the Cuban
event, culminating with an jazz and pop stars, includ- tion reached new heights Thomas R. Carter, president side wanted to expand the
all-star concert on April 30 ing jazz-rock band Weath- in the 1940s when bebop of the Thelonious Monk In- event from its usual one or
at the recently renovated er Report, for a three-day trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie stitute of Jazz, which orga- two days to an entire week
19th-century Gran Teatro festival that also featured brought Afro-Cuban per- nized the program in part- starting April 24 emphasiz-
de La Habana. The con- top Cuban ensembles, in- cussionist Chano Pozo into nership with the Cuban In- ing jazz education.q
cert will be broadcast live
on Cuban television and
live streamed by UNESCO.
Last year, Washington was
the host city with President
Barack Obama and first
lady Michelle Obama host-
ing the global concert at
the White House.
“Many times we think of
Cuba as having great
baseball players, which
they do, but they have
amazing jazz players and
we’ve experienced the
greatness of Cuban jazz
musicians for many, many
decades,” Hancock, a
UNESCO goodwill ambas-
sador, said in a telephone
interview.
Hancock will be bringing
about two dozen interna-
tional jazz artists to Cuba.
The roster includes Ameri-
cans such as singers Cas-
sandra Wilson and Kurt El-
ling, violinist Regina Carter,
bassist Marcus Miller and
bassist-singer Esperanza
Spalding as well as saxo-
phonist Igor Butman (Rus-
sia), trumpeters Till Bronner
(Germany) and Takuya
Kuroda (Japan), drummer
Antonio Sanchez (Mexico)
and oud player Dhafer
Youssef (Tunisia).
Unlike previous Interna-
tional Jazz Days outside
the U.S. when the host
country was represented
by only a few musicians,
at least 29 Cubans will be
performing at the concert,
including veterans such as