The 55th Annual Clark College Jazz Festival presents three days of jazz on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, January 26-28, in the Gaiser Center, 1933 Fort Vancouver Way, Vancouver.
Admission is $5 for each day and free for Clark College students and children under 12 (accompanied by an adult).
“It’s really inspiring to see the level of playing coming through the middle and high school programs in the Northwest. Jazz really is one of our American inventions and I’m happy to see that it continues to appeal to young musicians,” said Clark Festival Director Richard Inouye in a statement from Clark College.
Sixty middle and high school jazz ensembles from Washington and Oregon will be featured at the event. The top three jazz ensembles for middle schools and 1A – 4A division high schools will have the opportunity to bring home hardware.
Awards for individual outstanding musicians will be presented at the end of each division’s preliminary competitions and on Saturday evening, one outstanding band will be selected from the entire festival for the Dale Beacock Memorial Sweepstakes Award.
According to the statement, “Preliminary competitions for the 2017 festival will start on Thursday with middle schools from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., with middle school finals starting at 4 p.m. On Friday and Saturday, competition will begin at 8 a.m. with the 1A and 2A division jazz bands performing on Friday and 3A and 4A jazz bands taking the stage on Saturday. Final competitions will begin at 7 p.m. on Friday and Saturday evenings ending with the trophies presentation.”
The Clark College Jazz Ensemble will perform at 5 p.m. on Thursday; 12p.m. and 8:30 p.m. on Friday; 2nd 12:20 p.m. on Saturday.
The highlight of the event will be North Clark County’s very own Battle Ground High School Advanced Band and the 2016 Sweepstakes Band. Directed by Greg McKelvey, they will perform on Saturday night at 8:30 p.m.
“A huge component of the success of our festival is that students run it. Over 75 Clark music students volunteer countless hours to set up, tear down, and work the festival,” said Shelly Williams, the Clark Music Department program coordinator in the statement.
