The Cheltenham Jazz Festival performance from Kit Downes Trio featured on Jazz on 3 last night…
listen again right here (for seven days)

…and CONGRATULATIONS on their nomination for a Mercury Music Prize.

18 May 2010 — energy and ideas were in full flow at the Greenshoots action team meeting today. Our really exciting news was that HSBC, who kindly donate our office space, have indicated that they would like to meet up to discuss how the energy efficiency of the building could be improved.

With the Jazz Festival just over we spent time discussing how we could make things even better for the Science Festival, which is almost upon us. The special signage that we commissioned for the recycling areas had its first outing — it was good but not big enough so we are going to get some more done and make sure it gets reused for future festivals. Cup disposal took up a lot of air space — recycled plastic/card, recycling facilities, signage and locations. We’ve all got our actions to take away to get things even better.

The rest of the meeting looked at the policy stuff. Getting our action plan up on the web, divvying up who is going to take responsibility for what and making sure that behind all the action we have clear policies in place. So much energy, so much commitment — our biggest challenge is finding the time.

“British saxophonist Iain Ballamy and Norwegian percussionist Thomas Strønen create delicate and detailed ambient soundscapes that bring together a lyrical approach to jazz”

Listen again on BBC Radio 3

Another chance to hear one of our Barclays Cheltenham Jazz Festival 2010 concerts recorded specially for BBC Radio 3. Available on the BBC iPlayer for seven days.

Join the Cheltenham Festivals Membership Scheme while the Jazz Festival’s on and we’ll give you a free CD featuring festival artists — while stocks last!

Plus, you’ll save on coffee, cocktails and food at the fabulous D’FLY dome, enjoy discounts on any last minute jazz tickets you’d like to buy and receive free entry to our members’ enclosure.

All this in addition to ticket discounts and priority booking at all four festivals, now including Jazz 2011!

Join today

• Save £5 when you choose Direct Debit: apply online
• Visit the Members’ Enclosure — opposite the Budvar stage — at the Jazz Festival
• Call the box office on 0844 576 7977

More about the Cheltenham Festivals Membership Scheme

Terms and conditions

1. One free CD will be given to all new members, while stocks last.
2. The CD will be given at the time of joining at the members’ enclosure, or sent in the post for online, phone and postal applications.
3. No cash alternative will be given.

Ever wanted to learn to play to the piano like Jamie Cullum? Or get back into playing the drums?

This year, Barclays Cheltenham Jazz Festival has partnered with Yamaha to host a series of free group workshops where you can learn to play a range of Yamaha instruments whilst at the festival. Instruments include bass guitars, electric drum pads and electronic keyboards.

Just come along

Come down to the Playhouse Theatre on the day and sign up for a free 30-minute workshop, where a Yamaha-endorsed teacher will guide you through some great music.

Saturday 1 May

The Playhouse Theatre 3pm, 4pm and 5pm (30 minute sessions)

Sunday 2 May

The Playhouse Theatre 2pm, 3pm, 4pm 5pm and 6pm (30 minute sessions)

Photo: Thrill Collins performing at Curry Corner, Cheltenham

The allpay Jazz Fringe Festival blasted into action last week with the slide guitar of Alexander John and the rockin Tom Hollister Trio at the Frog & Fiddle. Cheltenham is now THE JAZZ TOWN…

With a relentless barrage of jazz sounds and upbeat tunes the allpay Jazz Fringe Festival brought some intriguing twists and turns of an evening. There was the improv-noise of Radioactive Sparrow (reforming after 7 years especially to play the festival) and the Cheltenham centric techno poetry set by Brown Torpedo with a warm appreciation from a packed Slaks.

More recognisable numbers flowed out of Montpellier Wine Bar on Saturday night as punters were transported back to the old streets of Paris with the music of Django Rheinhardt performed by the aptly named Swing from Paris.

Commuter Jazz around town

These were just some of the amazing pub gigs and like any good fringe the music comes to you as well as you seeking it out — our Commuter Jazz (kindly supported by Curry Corner) series does just this. Friends of the festival and dance group Jazz Jive Swing flash mobbed Cheltenham High Street with some shake rattle and roll while from Monday Jazzy antics found Cheltenham’s workers as Thrill Collins descending on UCAS HQ and guitarist Ryan Martin met workers as they headed home via Cheltenham’s bus stops.

Special guest opening Jazz on the Square

The allpay Jazz Fringe Festival and Commuter Jazz series continues as we launch the new Jazz on the Square site at 5.30pm on Thursday 29 April in Imperial Gardens — come on down — and watch out for a special guest will be opening the square.

Free music, food stalls, bars, family entertainment and more… see you there!

The allpay Jazz Fringe Festival starts on Thursday evening.

The allpay Jazz Fringe Festival opens with a blues night at the Frog and Fiddle with blues man Alexander John and the Tom Hollister Trio from 7.30pm, and a set at the Pittville Campus of the University of Gloucestershire.

Throughout the week you can enjoy a range of great jazz, blues, folk and electronic music in venues around Cheltenham for free as part of Jazz on the Town, the first of three areas we have developed as part of the new look fringe this year.

Fringe on the Town

As well as a series of evening gigs at Slak, Montpellier Wine Bar and the Beehive, you can relax with a drink after a hard week at work at our 5.30pm gig on Friday 23 at the Railway, presented in association with Cheltenham Underground. Or you can grab a relaxing Sunday lunch on 25th at The Exmouth Arms accompanied by some classic jazz standards. Then on Wednesday we have the Jazz Festival Quiz Extravaganza featuring loads of music, and general mirth in a one-off music quiz before the focus turns to the Fringe on the Square.

Fringe on the Square

The second stage of the allpay Cheltenham Fringe Festival, and the grand opening of our new free entry outdoor festival site Jazz on the Square in Imperial Gardens begins at 5.30pm on Thursday 29th April. The Square will play host to free live music, food stalls, outdoor bars and a range of entertainment across the bank holiday weekend culminating with a celebration of the local music scene on Monday 3 May.

Cheltenham Untapped

For a relatively small town Cheltenham punches well above it’s weight in terms of live music with a range of musicians, promoters and venues all working together to create a vibrant and interesting scene of which the town should be proud.

So join us to celebrate it at the final part of the allpay Cheltenham Fringe Festival, Cheltenham Untapped, on Monday 3 May at Jazz on the Square in Imperial Gardens. This is a whole day of gigs focussing on the fantastic local musicians and promoters who work hard around the year to put Cheltenham on the musical map.

Update: Artistic Director of the Barclays Cheltenham Jazz Festival, Tony Dudley-Evans, has been nominated for the Parliamentary Jazz Awards in the Services to Jazz category. Tony Dudley-Evans has been involved with Cheltenham Jazz Festival since its launch in 1996 and became the artistic director in 2002.

From Tony Dudley-Evans
Jazz Festival Artistic Director

Norway has a population of less than five million, but as a result of very strong government support for the general music scene and also for the many Norwegian jazz festivals (Bergen, Molde, Stavanger, Osloand many others) it has developed a very strong distinctive jazz scene.

“The emergence and increased exposure for Norwegian jazz is an amazing and heart warming phenomenon for a small relatively remote country”

Jazz has of course developed its own language and discourse in Europe different from the original American models and within Europe I think we can claim that there is a distinctive Scandinavian sound and taking to the next stage Norway is probably the strongest and most interesting scene in Scandinavia.

The range of jazz that is being played in Norway extends from some excellent trad bands through to the wildest and most exciting free jazz bands I have heard, like The Thing. But perhaps the most characteristic sound is that typified by Jan Garbarek’s music, a gentle contemplative sound that draws on Norwegian folk themes and ambient electronic sounds. It is perhaps a cliché to argue that the sound is influenced by the remoteness of much of the country and the sheer grandeur of the fjords, but there is something in the claim.

At the other end of the spectrum, the music of players such as Nils Petter Molvaer can be very loud and full on, but it always moves back to that gentler thoughtful style. These influences and mix of the gentle and the ‘full on’ are certainly there in two of the Norwegian bands we have booked: Food, the collaboration between Thomas Stronen of Norway and Iain Ballamy from UK and the band led by singer Beady Belle.

There is also a strong sense of fun in much Norwegian music and that is very apparent in Farmers Market, the band led by accordionist Stian Carstensen which draws on Balkan music as well as jazz and rock.

Finally the originality and innovative nature of much Norwegian jazz is often attributed to the excellence of music education in Norway; every school has its own bands and the jazz courses at Trondheim and Oslo Universities encourage the eclecticism and innovation that characterises the jazz scene. So we are delighted to be working with the jazz department at Trondheim University to bring over six students from Trondheim to form bands with students on the jazz course at Birmingham Conservatoire that will perform on the Saturday of the festival (1st May).

Buy tickets for this exciting collaboration

“When it’s a good festival like Cheltenham, it gives [the audience] a good range of experiences so they can really see the expanse of the music…”

Dave Holland

Click here to view the embedded video.