Community of Cool

“I think Martinborough is a cool place to have a jazz festival.  And it’s because we have a fantastic, supportive community that it happens every year,” says Jazz in Martinborough festival producer Ted Preston. “Hence the tag line this year Community of Cool.

Ted explains that each year the festival is supported by a large number of groups, individuals and businesses, many of whom go under-noticed or under-mentioned.

“We need these people in our community to help bring musicians to town, venues to play at, signs to go up etc,” he adds.  Support comes from the venues and musicians, the volunteers and supporters.  “We also get annual monetary and logistical support from the likes of Trust House, Creative Communities, South Wairarapa Rotary and Martinborough Lions – each representing a section of our community, contributing in their own way.”

The ninth spring festival of Jazz in Martinborough will see its main acts return to the newly refurbished Martinborough Town Hall.  “This too is a part of our community,” says Ted.  “The original festival was created to make more use of the Town Hall. It’s a great facility, that the community has invested in, and we need to have as many events there as possible,” he adds.

All three ticketed events will take place in the Town Hall this year, the NZSM Big Band Music Director Rodger Fox,  Jan Preston’s audio-visual show 88 Pianos I Have Known and the Zak Pack’s tribute to the The Great American Songbook Let’s Misbehave.

Over the nine years of the festival, money has been raised to help support the fallout from the Christchurch earthquakes, to help Kaikoura recover from their earthquake and to buy sound equipment for the Town Hall and for use around town.

“We’ve always been strong supporters of youth Jazz in the Wairarapa,” says Ted, “so we have added sponsorships to the Summer Jazz School to our fundraising platform.” Last year Jazz in Martinborough was supporting the 125th Anniversary of Women’s Suffrage and focussed on sending young female musicians, this year the scholarships will be open to all students from any of the participating colleges.  “There’s plenty of talent amongst our young musicians and we are keen to make things happen for them musically,” says Ted.

The 2019 festival, which has over 30 free gigs on over the weekend, as well as the three ticketed events, takes place from Thursday 29 August to Sunday 1 September.