Just Down the Road: The 2009 Iowa City Jazz Festival

Just about anywhere you live in the Midwest, you are less than a day away from one of the nation’s best-kept cultural secrets—the Iowa City Jazz Festival. Taking place annually over the first weekend of July, the Iowa City Jazz Festival celebrates its 17th on July 3-5. Held on the famed (and shaded!) “Pentacrest” of the University of Iowa, this festival has grown in stature and musical offerings to be one of the best of the free outdoor festivals in the nation, and is now a major component of the Iowa City Summer of the Arts program.  

With major sponsorship from Toyota-Scion of Iowa City, headliners this year represent one of the strongest line-ups in festival history, including David Sanchez, Trombone Shorty, Lionel Loueke, Chris Potter’s Underground, the Bill Frisell Quartet, and the Dave Holland Quintet. Interspersed among the national headliners will be the best of local and regional jazz, as well as youth and college band stages promoting the future of jazz in Iowa and beyond. Jams at the nearby Sheraton Hotel and area music bars ensure many hours of jazz for those who just can not get enough. Concessions across from the Pentacrest will keep the crowds fueled throughout the weekend, and feature such nonstandard Iowa fare as gourmet delights from the cuisines of India, Africa, Greece and Asia, along with “state fair” staples like corn dogs and ice cream.   

 

 

The David Sanchez Quartet will be performing at the Main Stage on Friday, July 3 at 8:00pm. The Grammy-winning tenor saxophonist leads a volcanic band with Thelonious Monk competition winner, Lage Lund, on guitar, Orlando Le Fleming on bass, and Henry Cole on the drums. A native of San Juan, Puerto Rico, Sanchez was influenced early on by the rhythms of his homeland, Cuba and Brazil as well as American jazz masters John Coltrane, Dexter Gordon, Charlie Parker and Sonny Rollins. He came to the US to study at Rutgers University and went on to play with Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Haden, Eddie Palmieri and more.  He’s garnered multiple Grammy and Latin Grammy nominations, winning the 2005 Latin Grammy for his recording, Coral. His 2007 release, Cultural Survival, was on many Top Ten lists. 

From the first event in 1991, the Iowa City Jazz Festival has grown from an intimate gathering of local jazz aficionados into a nationally recognized event averaging over 25,000 attendees each year. Some of the biggest names in jazz have headlined the ICJF, including John Scofield, Paquito D’Rivera, Joe Lovano, Kenny Garrett, Roy Haynes, Dave Douglas, Bill Frisell (returning in 2009), Joey de Francesco, Charlie Hunter, Greg Osby, Cubanismo, Pat Martino, Paul Motian, Don Byron, Andrew Hill, Carla Bley, Steve Swallow, Yellowjackets, Soulive, Patricia Barber, Sexmob, Stefon Harris, Geoffrey Keezer and Robin Eubanks. The sponsors underwrite all costs of producing the event, allowing it be presented to the public at no charge, thus attracting a diverse audience of university students, families, and jazz enthusiasts from all over the Midwest.

JazzSet (National Public Radio) has recognized the Iowa City Jazz Festival by recording the festival four times.