Elkhart Jazz Fest provides biggest showcase yet in year 35

 

ELKHART, Ind. – Downtown Elkhart is alive with the sound of jazz this weekend as the city is set to go on with its 35th Annual Jazz Festival.

The internationally acclaimed event is bigger than ever, with more than 100 performances throughout the weekend, the majority of which are free.

Shows will be spread throughout the downtown area and beyond, with performances in Central Park, The Lerner Theater, the South Main Stage, Library Atrium and Wellfield Botanical Gardens.

The festival officially kicked off Thursday at 7 p.m. with a free concert by Truth in Jazz, a big-band group that aims to educate future generations of jazz musicians.

“One of Truth in Jazz’s — one of our main missions is to go to local schools, go to festivals, go to clinics, and kind of create a relationship with young high school musicians and to kind of show them, ‘This is what a jazz band looks like outside of school and this is what a professional group sounds like. This is what we do.” said vocalist, Erica Kinsman.

Another goal of the festivities is to broaden the public’s perspective on what exactly jazz is and how it’s grown and expanded over the years.

“The jazz has changed. And what I mean by that is, we’re not doing old people's jazz anymore. There’s going to be some bands that do that, they play Dixieland and things like that, but there’s a lot of contemporary jazz. And that doesn’t mean weird contemporary, that means more rock infused jazz,” said musician and local professor, Jim Catalano.

More information about the jazz festival and the headliners of the event can be found here.