One-third of Festival performances headlined by women performers at the vanguard of jazz and world music

In each San Francisco Jazz Festival schedule predominant themes develop. One year it’s an abundance of pianists. The next it’s an embarrassment of saxophones. It’s an encouraging sign of the current state of jazz, then, that over one-third of fall Festival headliners are women, including vocalists and (historically more rare in jazz) instrumentalists. Here’s a quick breakdown of some of the talented female instrumental performers at the 24th Festival:

• Piano/organ innovator Alice Coltrane (11/4)
• Brazilian guitarist, songwriter, and singer extraordinaire Badi Assad (10/21)
• Jazz, funk, and everything-in-between bassist Meshell Ndegeocello (10/22)
• Bop pianist Toshiko Akiyoshi in an exclusive Members-only solo recital (10/28)
• The powerful chops and air-tight arrangements of Oakland’s own Montclair Women’s Big Band
• Pianist, composer, and UC Berkeley professor Myra Melford (11/4)
• Guitar virtuosa Mimi Fox (11/11)
• Multi-instrumentalist and composer Gina Leishman, co-leading the Kamikaze Ground Crew (11/1)

For more information on all these artists, see the “Sophisticated Ladies” article in the SFJAZZ Newsletter, coming to a mailbox near you later this month. Also, be sure to check out the wide range of talented vocalists at this year’s Festival, including 2006 SFJAZZ Beacon Award winner Mary Stallings (11/10), Brazilian superstar Marisa Monte (11/4-11/5), Portuguese fadista Ana Moura (11/12), and Bay Area swing chanteuse Lavay Smith (10/22 &11/9).

Five Weeks of Jazz Discoveries

Another Labor Day gone and the school year’s in full swing again, for kids and jazz-heads alike. The SFJAZZ Discover Jazz: History and Appreciation Course begins September 21 and runs for five successive Thursdays at the Jewish Community Center of San Francisco leading up to the eve of the Festival’s opening night concert with Sonny Rollins on October 20. Perfect for beginners looking to explore America’s greatest art form or jazz aficionados who want to hone their chops, this year’s course, taught by Bay Area jazz educator and flugelhornist Dmitri Matheny, runs the gamut of jazz history.

Listening to Jazz: The Basics (9/21) is a primer on the building blocks of jazz: setting the rhythm, stating the melody, and building harmonies. The next class, Crash Course: The History of Jazz in 60 Minutes (9/28), is an enlightened sprint through over a century of jazz history, highlighting the key players and styles that define each era. Tunes & Toons: Jazz in Animation (10/5) ties in with this year’s Betty Boop event of the same name which will feature film clips of Boop and jazz luminaries Louis Armstrong and Cab Calloway, and music by Lavay Smith & Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers. Another take on jazz and its effect on the visual arts is explored in Visual Music: Modern Jazz, Modern Art (10/12), which explores how sounds and images have come together in the modern period. Rounding out the course is Building Your Jazz Recording Collection (10/19), an essential guide to starting (or expanding) a jazz library.

The printed Discover Jazz materials provided with each class (including a syllabus, bibliography, discography, filmography, and online resources) ensure students can continue their jazz study, and enjoyment of the music, for years to come.

There are two ways to enroll in Discover Jazz: the full course is available for $100 ($80 for SFJAZZ & Jewish Community Center Members); individual classes are $25 each (no discount). Enrollment for the full course is ongoing until September21. Individual classes are on first-come-first-served basis. Call 800-225-2277 or enroll online.

Dewey Redman performing in the 2006 SFJAZZ Spring Season at Herbst Theatre.

Dewey Redman (1931-2006)

Saxophonist Dewey Redman, who appeared at SFJAZZ this past Spring Season to celebrate his 75th birthday, passed away over the weekend. Redman, father of SFJAZZ Collective tenor saxophonist and Spring Season Artistic Director Joshua Redman, was described in his New York Times obituary as "an expansive and poetic tenor saxophonist and bandleader who had been at the aesthetic frontiers of jazz since the 1960s."

Read New York Times obituary