Kirkwood jazz station offers free music in Noelridge Park, Thursdays in August
The 2008 lineup of Jazz Under The Stars will feature jazz, blues and R&B from veteran performers as well as one of the country’s most talented teenage performers.
Jazz 88.3 KCCK, public radio from Kirkwood Community College, will stage the 21st year of Jazz Under The Stars in August. The free concerts will take place each Thursday in Noelridge Park in Cedar Rapids. The 2008 season brings in both familiar names on the Corridor music scene along with new talent.
The performance schedule includes:
• August 7 – Kevin “B.F.” Burt & the Instigators
• August 14 – The Gabe Medd Group
• August 21 – Chris Merz and the X-tet
• August 28 – The Diplomats of Solid Sound
The scheduled rain date for all concerts will be Thursday, September 4.
Station Manager Dennis Green says, “Once again this year, Jazz Under The Stars will present a variety of musicians and music styles that showcase the incredible talent in the Cultural Corridor. We’re especially pleased that we can not only feature veteran talent who have large followings, but also give people a chance to hear a young player just coming into his prime.”
Food will be available again this year. Friends and families are invited to bring picnic baskets, blankets, and lawn chairs to sit under the stars and enjoy the music. Major support for KCCK’s Jazz Under the Stars series comes from Panera Bread, Pat McGrath Chevyland, Collins Community Credit Union, The Gazette, Rockwell Collins and Kirkwood.
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• Kevin “B.F.” Burt and the Instigators, one of the most influential blues groups in the Corridor, will kick off the season. Kevin is a self-taught musician (harmonica and guitar) whose smooth, warm vocal presentation sets a mood of relaxed exhilaration, with a welcome mixture of serious music and infectious humor audiences of all ages seem to enjoy. Burt is not only a musical performer, but also a composer and actor. He has won numerous awards, played festivals both solo and with his band as well as shared billing with many of the top names in music all over the country. Awards include Best Band in Iowa City (twice), Iowa Blues Challenge Champions, and he was named “One of the top 25 unsigned blues bands in the world” by the International Blues Challenge Competition.
• Gabe Medd is one of the most talented young trumpeters in the country. Medd is a senior at Iowa City West High School who has performed at venues spanning from the Great Wall of China to the North Sea Jazz Festival in Holland. He also earned the privilege to play in the Gibson/Baldwin GRAMMY Jazz Ensemble in Los Angeles this past February. His group will feature Adam Kromelow, a downbeat award-winning pianist from Chicago, who now attends the Manhattan School of Music. The drummer in this combo is David Gugliano, a Science-Music double major who will be a junior at the University of Iowa this fall.
• Saxophonist/composer UNI Director of Jazz Studies, Chris Merz will lead the 12-piece ensemble, the X-tet. This group combines the power and excitement of a big band with the flexibility and intimacy of a small group. Compositions encompass styles from tightly structured counterpoint to freedom. Stylistic touch points include straight-ahead hard bop, Kansas City riffs (by way of Sun Ra), ethereal musings in the manner of Kenny Wheeler, and hip-hop. Many pieces veer between several of these approaches.
• The Diplomats of Solid Sound, featuring the Diplomettes, will wrap up the season. Since 2001, the Diplomats of Solid Sound have been mining America’s vast deposits of soul music to create a sound all their own — a spare-but-spicy groove sired equally by progenitors such as Booker T., James Brown and The Funk Brothers. With the addition of a trio of sultry sirens, they take on a whole new sound which is sure to get the crowd moving.
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Jazz 88.3 KCCK-FM is a locally-programmed public radio station owned by Kirkwood Community College, broadcasting in analog FM and HD Radio at 88.3 FM. Johnson County translator at 106.9 FM and webcasting at www.kcck.org. KCCK has presented Jazz Under the Stars every summer since 1988.
For more information contact KCCK General Manager Dennis Green at (319) 398-7120.