"Koktebel, we love you": the main jazz festival has opened in Crimea

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

On August 24, the opening of the XVI festival Koktebel Jazz Party took place in the Crimean city of Koktebel. This is the name given to the main festival, which is held here in the summer months. On the first evening, performances by performers from Great Britain, India, jazzmen from New Orleans took place on the main site of the festival.

The main stage of the Koktebel Jazz Party is located on the Black Sea coast. You can enjoy high-quality jazz music while sitting in a cafe or just on the beach. In the next three days, jazz compositions will be heard everywhere. The city will become one large open-air platform.

Dmitry Kiselev, journalist and founder of the Koktebel Jazz Party jazz festival, said during its next opening that this musical direction is a kind of synthesis of different cultures, and therefore it unites peoples. The main idea of the Crimean Jazz Festival is precisely to unite.

This time, the Rebirth Jazz Band team from New Orleans, which is considered the birthplace of jazz, was responsible for the opening of the jazz music festival in Koktebel. This group is the laureates of the prestigious Grammy Award and they immediately found a common language with the guests of the event, who began to dance and sing along with the performers.

Then there was a performance by musicians from India, who in their music were able to find an excellent combination of jazz and national motives. During the break between the performances of foreign jazz performers, the duet of Oleg Starikov and Yakov Okun played. On the opening day, the American band Rick Margitza and the British band Incognito, playing acid jazz music, took to the stage of the Koktebel Jazz Party festival.

One of the members of the Incognito team said that the Crimean festival, or rather the performances that are held at this time, reminds him of the music of his native places, because he grew up on the ocean shore. During his interview, he noted that teams, which include musicians from different countries, come out at the price of Koktebel Jazz Party. International teams in jazz are more the rule than the exception, and this is important for this musical direction, since each representative of their country can contribute their own characteristics and thereby make musical compositions even more interesting.