The 34th April Jazz Festival was already announced to be canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic but will be held after all through a live stream from April 22nd to 25th. The April Jazz Subgrooves live streaming festival presents eight jazz performances altogether, two each night. The live stream is available globally at Keikalla.fi -website.
“Canceling our festival was certainly a setback. But soon we started to ponder whether it might be possible to arrange this year’s festival after all with the streaming technique. There wasn’t a lot of time, yet lots of puzzles with artists and technique. Group size restrictions by the Finnish government and the safety matters for all involved brought its own challenge. Now I’m very happy to be able to announce that the streaming festival is going to happen”, April Jazz festival director Matti Lappalainen explains.
Program of the April Jazz Subgrooves presents some of the front-row-artists of the Finnish jazz scene and the rising stars of the new generation. Since the restrictions on group sizes need to be taken into account, this is a great opportunity to showcase smaller groups such as duos and even solo performances, which usually are challenging to bring to big festival stages. “The smaller groups convey the intimate and dangerous atmosphere that makes jazz such interesting music. Now the high-quality video-recording brings the essence of live performance straight into our living rooms”, Lappalainen rejoices. Restrictions and challenges would not compromise the quality and essence of April Jazz but offer even better change to introduce the buzzing local jazz scene internationally, all available environmentally friendly in homes around the globe.
April Jazz Subgrooves artists include several groups performing freshly released or soon to be released new music, such as the new duo project of saxophonist Timo Lassy and drummer Teppo Mäkynen, newly released jazz quartet Superposition featuring drummer and composer Olavi Louhivuori and some of the most ear-worthy musical talents in the Finnish scene, Kadi Vija Key Project with an intriguing rhythmic and melodic tapestries of voice, bass clarinet, guitar, and drums. Few visionary solo performances are listed as well: award-winning pianist and composer Kari Ikonen explores the wide scale of the grand piano and even Arabic micro-intervals using his own innovation Maqiano. Percussionist and sound artist Tatu Rönkkö transforms everyday items such as plastic bottles into music. The last performer is yet to be announced.
In addition to music, the concert intermissions are filled with interviews of the artists and discussions on music and current topics such as creativity in the time of pandemic and isolation. The discussions, as well as the festival stream, are hosted by Finnish radio host and DJ Njassa. Discussions are done in English to serve international audiences as well.
April Jazz Subgrooves is a co-operation of April Jazz, Keikalla.fi, Musician’s Union in Finland, the City of Espoo and G Livelab Helsinki.
APRIL JAZZ SUBGROOVES:
Wednesday 22th April
6 PM Verneri Pohjola & Mika Kallio: Animal Image (film + live soundtrack)
8 PM Kadi Vija Key Project
Thursday 23th April
6 PM Maja Mannila
8 PM Timo Lassy & Teppo Mäkynen
Friday 24th April
6 PM Tatu Rönkkö solo
8 PM Superposition
Saturday 25th April
6 PM TBA
8 PM Kari Ikonen solo
Tickets available at www.lippu.fi
One evening, including 2 concerts: 9,90€ (+ delivery fee from 1€)
April Jazz Subgrooves festival pass, including 4 evenings and 8 concerts: 29,90€ (+ delivery fee from 1€)
All the concerts are available to watch for 6 days after streaming.
More information: apriljazz.fi