2011 Taichung Jazz Festival highlights the best of Western, Asian, Taiwanese jazz

Words by Douglas Habecker
Translated by Angel Pu

When music lovers in Taiwan want to experience a hearty helping of the best jazz the world has to offer, they need to go no further than Taichung each year in October. Since its founding just about a decade ago, the Taichung Jazz Festival has stood head and shoulders over any other jazz event on the island (including Taipei) and for a few years now has been recognized as one of Asia's top jazz festivals.

Although Taichung is an increasingly cosmopolitan city, this largest annual central Taiwan musical event still surprises and impresses Taiwanese and foreigners alike with its international ambiance. Typical festival evenings (especially weekends) see thousands of audience members sprawled across the grass of Civic Square (People's Park) with blankets, food and drinks, even candles and bottles of wine, enjoying the live musical feast on the main stage and the excitement that shared large-scale communal events always generates.

For Taichung Jazz Festival veterans, this year's Saturday, Oct. 15 to Sunday, Oct. 23 event will see some big changes from other festivals, due to recent construction/renovation work on the Jingguo Boulevard parkway (soon-to-be-renamed Calligraphy Greenway) and Civic Square that has sealed off all of the parkway and parts of the square. Although Civic Square work is scheduled to be completed in time for the festival, the parkway will remain closed. This means that this year's performances will revolve around two stages--the main "World Jazz" Stage on Civic Square, and the smaller "Swing Jazz" Stage in the CMP BLOCK complex behind the Park Lane by CMP (Eslite) Mall facing Jingguo Boulevard. In an unprecedented move, four more intimate "Jazz VIP Night" concerts will also take place on an indoor "Feeling Jazz" stage on CMP BLOCK's B1-level 9 to 10 p.m. on Saturday-Sunday, Oct. 15-16 and Friday-Saturday, Oct. 21-22.

As the schedule reveals, main-stage concerts will start at 6 p.m. on the festival's first and last days, at 7 p.m. on other weekend nights, and at 8 p.m. on weekday evenings. The smaller stage will see live music from 2 p.m. on weekends and 5 p.m. on weekdays. With the parkway out of use this year, food and drink vendor booths will mostly be located around the periphery of Civic Square--making things less congested--and will be offering the usual international variety of items from about 4-5 p.m. on weekdays and early afternoon on weekends.

Venue changes and other details aside, the real "meat" that gives this festival so much flavor every year is the consistently outstanding line-up of musicians invited each year, ranging from some of the biggest living jazz legends to top Asian and Taiwanese artists. Jazz being the fluid, constantly evolving genre that it is, the music itself ranges across a broad spectrum, from classic big-band groups to vocal ensembles and the latest in electronically-driven modern fusion jazz--something to please any music lover, whatever their tastes.

Headlining this year's festival are American jazz greats like trumpeter Charles Tolliver (a favorite of Dizzy Gillespie himself); pianist McCoy Tyner, the only living member of John Coltrane's groundbreaking quartet (see separate Sept. and Oct. "Jazz Spotlight" articles); and Chris Potter, considered one of the world's best sax players. Others include the seven-piece Mingus Dynasty ensemble, the Sirius Quartet from New York City, the extraordinary, award-winning German a capella vocal quintet known as Tonalrausch.

Asia long ago embraced jazz and has over the decades generated some tremendous, world-class talent. Thus, one of the most enjoyable elements of the Taichung festival has been the strong sampling of musicians from across the continent, this year including Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and mainland China.

While they didn't fly in to be here, Taiwan's artists offer some of the festival's highest caliber of jazz. This year will see a combination of perennial favorites and new faces, including the Kupa Big Band (founded in 1953), Dizzy Jazz Orchestra, Montunos Latin Band, Taiwanese-Japanese trio Yellow Funky Stuff, JazzMe Funk/Fusion Jazz Band, Miles Chiu & Jazz UPE, The Polish Gangsters (a quintet of Taiwan-based foreign musicians) and newly-formed Okinawan-flavored Umikaji Band.

The Taichung Jazz Festival has always featured other related educational and entertainment facets as well. The CMP BLOCK B1 area will host a variety of jazz lectures (Oct. 8-9 afternoons); advanced classes led by Tolliver, Tyner and other international jazz artists (mornings, afternoons of Oct. 15 and 23); and nightly Monday-to-Friday 8 p.m. "Jazz Dreaming" movie showings, from "Cadillac Records" on Tuesday to Disney's "The Princess and the Frog" on Thursday and Woody Allen's "Sweet and Lowdown" on Friday.

For more Chinese and English festival details, concert schedules, artist backgrounds and travel information, check the official 2011 Taichung Jazz Festival website at www.taichungjazz2011.com.tw