22 stunning musicians and performers for nine nights, from February 14 to 22, became the "culprits" of a good mood among lovers of jazz, blues, rock and just good music, performing as part of one of the most iconic music events of the year - the Dubai Jazz Festival. This year, the 11th jazz festival held in Dubai brought together a galaxy of world famous musicians, including: American pop rock band OneRepublic, American rock band 3 Doors Down, rock dinosaurs - British band Deep Purple, The Script, an Irish pop-rock band, YellowJackets jazz quartet, New York guitarist Chuck Loeb, musician, composer and producer Nicholas Cole and Lebanese-Armenian pianist and fusion jazz performer Gai Manukyan. However, the performances of these stars were far from the only pleasure that the festival could offer.
In 2009, as part of the Emirates Airline Dubai Jazz Festival, another music venue called “Jazz Garden” was created, which was and remains a real “haven” for purists. In the "Garden", which is conveniently located near the main stage of the festival, evening concerts were held with the participation of such famous performers as guitarist and composer Paul Brown, jazz guitarist Marc Antoine, as well as singer and accordionist Brian Templeton, the British performer of soft jazz Oli Silk, trumpeter Lin Runtree, blues singer Barrens Whitfield, singer and saxophonist Sax Gordon, jazz singer Tony Lynn Washington.
According to Anthony Youns, chief executive officer of Chillout Productions, the main goal of Jazz Garden is to create balance when the organizing company takes into account all the wishes of the audience, whose musical preferences are very different: "We want people who come to the festival and have different musical tastes, found something similar in spirit and preferences. The "Garden" should have a special mood and atmosphere. It should look like a small musical cozy club, accommodating, however, from three to four thousand people. "" Un The ubiquity of the Jazz Garden concept is that the musicians perform differently from ordinary concerts. People can come there without knowing the music that they play there. But they must leave with the feeling that they have been to a great entertaining event, ”said Youns. "I constantly get messages on Facebook with suggestions about which artists to bring to us next time so that the festival is completely jazz. Often we listen to them, bring in artists, but then it turns out that anyway someone remains Xia dissatisfied. Therefore, I can’t say yet that this festival is jazz. It seems to me that Dubai, like the UAE, is not ready for such a “pure” product. And while this is so, we will invite stars from other musical genres, otherwise the festival will not survive. "
It is pleasant to note that the "Jazz Garden" not only successfully complements the performances of musicians and singers on the main venue of the festival, but is also a uniquely implemented idea that has no analogues in the whole region. Having consolidated the success of last year, when the “Garden” was visited by a total of more than 40 thousand listeners, this year this figure increased and exceeded the mark of a total of 50 thousand lovers and connoisseurs of good music.
Well, and, of course, the climax "chord" of the festival was its final day, which, without understating, can be called the brightest moment!
The festival park Dubai Festival City gathered more than 12 thousand people. And this is understandable, because such stars as Paul Brown, Marc Antoine, Oli Silk, Lin Runtry and Brian Simpson, the brightest representatives of soft jazz, performed before them this evening. They set the stage for the appearance of the American jazz quartet Yellow Jackets, which performed for the public their most famous hits. But that was not all. With a sinking heart, the audience was waiting for the musicians of the Irish pop-rock band The Script to appear on the stage, who did not spare all their strength, skills and talents so that the 2013 jazz extravaganza would be remembered for a long time by the grateful audience of Dubai.
The time has come for parting. But this is not a cause for sadness at all, but only for an impatient desire to wait until 2014 to find out what kind of syncops and improvisations the musicians invited to Chillout Productions to Dubai will perform for us.
