EDMONDS — Jazz has a solid home in south Snohomish County.
For example, the Mountlake Terrace and Edmonds Woodway high school jazz bands currently are among the top in the nation. And vocal jazz has been an important art form in Edmonds area high schools for nearly 50 years.
Tonight and Saturday mark the 41st annual DeMiero Jazz Festival at the Edmonds Center for the Arts. It was first of its kind when it debuted in 1977 at Edmonds Community College, where living music legend Frank DeMiero was teaching.
Actually, it’s still one of a kind. Unlike most other vocal music festivals, this one doesn’t involve a competition. The DeMiero Jazz Fest provides 60-some student jazz choirs from around the state with support and encouragement, and it offers the public two nights of outstanding jazz concerts.
During the day, vocal music clinicians and guest artists hear performances by middle school, high school and college ensembles and then critique and mentor each one on one. Students also attend a variety of workshops given by jazz musicians. In the evening these guest artists perform the best in vocal jazz.
“Ours is a festival where everyone goes home a winner,” DeMiero said. “We accentuate the positive and teach by example with the help of some of the finest jazz artists in the world.”
Singer Kristin Erickson Colburn agrees.
The 59-year-old Edmonds woman has known DeMiero since she was a sophomore at Mountlake Terrace High School, where the jazz man was teaching at the time. This year, as she has done in the past, Colburn is volunteering at the festival.
“The deal about this jazz festival, is that the kids — the jazz nerds who might be bullied at their schools — develop such confidence here that they go away pumped and ready to return home to just be themselves,” Colburn said. “And then they can go anywhere in the world and be connected with other musicians.”
DeMiero’s former students, and the students of those students, have created a passion for vocal jazz in the region, Colburn added.
Here’s the lineup for performances on Friday and Saturday:
The festival’s all-star combo — guitarist Bruce Forman, drummer Cook Broadnax, pianist Josh Nelson and bassist Paul Beaudry — will accompany all the performances.
John Proulz is a Los Angeles-based swinging hot pianist whose his voice is smooth and mellow. He is a Grammy award-winning composer and popular on the LA scene.
True North is a California-based vocal jazz quartet that also likes to sing funk, pop and R&B. The members — Katie Campbell, Sharmila Lash, Fletcher Sheridan and Matt Falker — are teachers, recording artists and session musicians.
The festival’s artistic director is Dee Daniels, who DeMiero calls the “Second Lady of Jazz” (the first being Ella Fitzgerald), has performed internationally. “Her four-octave range will inspire and thrill,” DeMiero said.
Josh Tazman, the 2017 Dee Daniels Vocal Jazz Scholarship recipient, is an 18-year-old vocalist, pianist and composer from the San Francisco Bay Area. He has won numerous awards and contests, and has performed with a variety of well-known jazz musicians.
DeMiero’s Seattle Jazz Singers are set to perform Friday night and Edmonds Community College’s Soundsation will perform Saturday evening.
If you go
DeMiero Jazz Fest, continues with performances at 7 p.m. March 3 and 4 at the Edmonds Center for the Arts, 410 Fourth Ave. N. Tickets, $25 to $70, available at the ECA Box Office, 425-275-9595, or www.demierojazzfest.org.
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