Jazz globus makes 10

The nine-day festival spreads its cultural wings with a range of genres.

By BARRY DAVIS
German drummer Klaus Kugel (photo credit: grigory hatin)
German drummer Klaus Kugel
(photo credit: grigory hatin)
It is no mean feat to keep any cultural venture going these days, so for a relatively small jazz event to make it through its first decade in one piece is cause for celebration.
The lineup of the 10th edition of the annual Jerusalem Jazz Globus Festival, which will take place at Harmony Hall on Hillel Street in Jerusalem from November 28 to December 6, indicates the event is not only surviving, but flourishing. The festival, which is overseen by its perennial artistic director, internationally acclaimed Lithuania-born composer and pianist-keyboardist Slava Ganelin, was initially a predominantly Russian affair.
While there are still plenty of Russiansounding names on the roster, the festival has clearly spread its cultural wings, and there is a wide range of genres and cultural baggage on offer over the nine days.
The program opener features American singer Janine Carter, who will add her husky, gospel-inflected vocals to the instrumental endeavor of Ukraine-born Israeli saxophonist Robert Anchipolovsky and his band.
Next Saturday evening’s lineup offers an intriguing variety of spots which should appeal to jazz fans of a more adventurous nature. The evening’s entertainment kicks off with the Ost-West concert by a quintet that features players from Lithuania, Israel and Germany , with the latter represented by drummer Klaus Kugel. That will be followed by the Dots and Waves Quintet fronted by Jerusalemite pianist-vocalist Julia Feldman, and also including veteran Israeli avant garde saxophonist Albert Beger, flutist Dvir Katz, bassist Assaf Hakimi and drummer Adam Cohen. The evening will close with what promises to be a highly entertaining, lyrically energized show by Jerusalemite saxophonist Elad Gellert and the Shalosh trio of pianist Gadi Stern, double bass player Daniel Ben- Horin and drummer Matan Assayag.
There are more sounds from the homeland of jazz on December 2, courtesy of American vibraphonist Marc Sherman and compatriot saxophonist Alexei Zoubov, who will perform with three Israel-based musicians – trumpeter Gregory Ryvkin, Australian-born bassist Simon Starr and drummer Yaki Levi. Latin jazz fans should enjoy the December 3 show by multi-instrumentalist Yehuda Glantz’s Latin Jazz Quintet, while the festival’s cosmopolitan spread stretches a little further in the second slot of the evening, with double bass player Tal Gamlieli’s quartet featuring a first-time foray to this part of the world by Luxembourg-born pianist Michel Reis.
The December 4 event will, fittingly, be a largely Russian affair and is dedicated to the memory of late Russian-born MK Yuri Shtern, who died of cancer in 2007 at the age of 57. The first show of the evening features the Jerusalem Electronic Trio of pianist-synthesizer player Michael Agre, guitarist Dennis Sobolev and drummer Noam Landsman, with Sobolev also appearing in Zoubov’s Rejuvenation Project. The last slot will be a high-energy offering of all manner of musical sensibilities by the Jerusalem Jazz Band. Veteran reedman Boris Gammer will also lend his vocals to the fray, and he will be joined by saxophonist Oleg Naiman, trumpeter Arthur Krasnobaev, guitarist and banjo player Ilia Siltsoff, double bass player Valery Lipez and drummer Yevgeny Maistrovsky. Zoubov and pianist Shimon Lipkovich will put in guest appearances.
Youngsters will also be given a chance to strut their stuff at the festival, and the second evening is devoted to the Student Ensemble of the Sadna Jerusalem Conservatory, located in the German Colony. And the musical mindset will flow thick and fast on December 1, when the artistic action decamps to the Birman bistro on Dorot Rishonim Street for what, no doubt, will be a fun-filled jam session by various artists in the festival lineup.