by brisjazzclub | Mar 18, 2022
Find your path to professional performances
Wildly popular—in fact, often our best attended night each month—this performer-friendly event is a ‘club within a club’.
It’s become something of a legacy in Brisbane’s cultural heritage. Leading jazz singer and educator Ingrid James, who is also the director of The Brisbane Vocal Jazz Festival, produces and presents the program. 2021 marked its 20th year and to celebrate, a digital archive of photographs and history will soon be available at the Queensland State Library.
12 singers perform two contrasting songs each, accompanied by a top-quality, professional jazz trio. Whether you’re new to jazz, a student, or a professional looking for some new challenges, you are welcome.
This is your chance to show off your talent in front of a highly supportive audience and make friends in the process. We also welcome instrumentalists to sit in with the house band, which alternates each month.
Gain professional experience
It’s unlike any experience you’ll gain from a music academy or jazz school. Participation is a strategic steppingstone for many emerging singers. It helps you transition to the professional stage with confidence.
- Perform at a professional venue with a pro house band, specialist sound and lighting, professional photographers and occasional live broadcasts on radio.
- Artists and audience listen, support and celebrate your performance, ready with encouragement.
- Rub shoulders with seasoned performers. Work with new musicians. Learn to direct the band and communicate as a team player.
- Discover your own nuances and interpretations of songs. Learn to test your own boundaries.
- Meet like-minded artists. Make new friends as you share the joy of jazz.
All in all, it’s a fun night out with lots of opportunity to meet other performers and build confidence.
- First Thursday of every month
- 7-10pm at the club (Doors open at 6pm)
- Complimentary table seating outdoors on the river deck for performers, or book a table inside.
- Bar and table service is available with a restaurant menu
by brisjazzclub | Mar 18, 2022
Brisbane Youth Jazz Festival
An impressive new generation of jazz
This festival is a niche space for young, emerging jazz musicians. It’s tailored to the aspirations of the next generation of professional musicians.
Performing in front of a live audience in a professional venue does a lot for building confidence and gaining maturity as musicians. We’ve seen that happen time and again. This festival enables young people to take their skills to the next level in a non-competitive atmosphere, giving them an opportunity to shine.
“…the ‘professionalism’ and the sheer joy…”
It’s hard to know where to start in describing the enthusiasm, the quality of the playing, the ‘professionalism’ and the sheer joy that we all experienced in our first ever Brisbane Youth Jazz Festival.
Alan Western | Vice President of Brisbane Jazz Club
Audiences are typically made up of family and friends of the musicians, but anyone is welcome. We encourage warm feedback and support of the performers.
If you’re anywhere between 9- and 21-years-old and you play in a jazz band, this festival was designed with you in mind. Most participants are school and college bands, but any youth band of three instruments or more can request to participate.
Besides the opportunity for your band to be in the spotlight at a professional event, you’ll come away with a heap of other things to talk about.
- Meet other bands. It’s not a competition, and with four or five different bands playing each night, you get to hang out with others who love band life just as much as you do.
- Learn from each other. It’s a chance to watch other bands in action, see different styles and learn new techniques from each other. There’s nothing like learning while doing.
- Get used to playing to a public audience. It’s not just mum, dad or your friends in the audience. Anyone can buy a ticket, and the numbers have risen to just under 200 people per night. But don’t worry, the audience at this festival will cheer you on.
- Get professional feedback. The festival host and patrons provide feedback to performing bands to tweak and fine-tune your learning.
The festival is held in May every year and includes:
- Four shows over four nights
- Four to five bands performing at each show
by brisjazzclub | Mar 18, 2022
Brisbane Big Band Festival
Jazz on full power
20 bands, 350 musicians and 4 nights of swinging sound.
If jazz bands were cars, big bands would be the V8s. There’s a big difference between a regular 8-piece jazz band and an 18-piece big band. Big bands create a majestic sound that gets into your bones and gives you gooseflesh. It fills the room.
Savour a variety of jazz flavours. Big bands aren’t limited to one genre. You’ll hear Latin jazz, the standard classics of the 30s and 40s, original compositions and—heck, we’ve even had heavy metal, big band style.
Indulge in a wealth of sound – trumpets, saxes, trombones, piano, bass, drums and guitar, topped with a vocalist. Big band music teases out every instrument’s moment to shine. How often do you hear the alto, tenor and baritone sax in one band? Or four trumpets harmonising with each other?
Meet jazz greats like:
- John Morrison, once voted Australia’s best big band drummer
- Jackie Cooper, acclaimed jazz and big band singer
- Both are regular patrons of this festival. During the festival, they generously provide mentoring, critiques on performances and workshops.
In September each year, this festival hosts:
- Five shows, each featuring four participating bands, over four days.
- Workshops for musicians and vocalists, held by renowned big band musicians.
- You won’t easily get to hear 80+ musicians in one place on a night out anywhere else.
- But it only happens once a year.
Do you love a fully charged atmosphere where the sound gets into your veins? Are you a regular on the big band scene? Do you want to experience a slice of jazz from its origins?
Then this is an event you’ll want to mark in your calendar.
by brisjazzclub | Mar 18, 2022
OzManouche – September 26th to 29th 2024
Discover the only jazz manouche festival in Australia
Thursday 24 November to Sunday 27 November 2022
- Rub shoulders with international masters and world-standard Australian manouche bands that bring you authentic rhythms of Europe.
- Get up close and personal with rhythm and lead guitars, violins and double basses.
- Trade ideas, learn songs and get to know other jazz musicians through jam sessions on the river deck.
Emerging from traditional manouche style, younger players are adding new sounds and flavours every festival, with captivating results.
Walk away with new experiences, new exposures, new skills, and new friends.
Jazz that grew from campfires to concerts
It’s an exotic jazz style in a genre of its own. ‘Manouche’ is the beautiful French word meaning ‘gypsy’. Break down ‘OzManouche’ and you’ve got it—Australian Gypsy Jazz.
Django Reinhardt, its founder from way back in the 1930s, was from the Manouche clan of French travellers. Sitting around a fire with guitar, violins and maybe the odd accordion, they created a new jazz style that had no piano or drums, but ‘hot’ guitar with percussive rhythm.
Trending with today’s thriving European jazz manouche scene, OzManouche captures the hearts of young and old with its spontaneity and spark. Flavours of music from the cobbled streets of Paris and rural France fill Brisbane Jazz Club. The energy of manouche jazz pulses through fingers on guitars, violin bows and on to a knee-slapping audience.
Its popularity had grown since it started in 2005. Tickets have sold out in recent years.
In November each year, this four-day festival brings you riveting rhythm, melody and improvisation.
- Top international guests perform two sets each evening, with a third jam session
- Instrument-specific workshops add spark to your skills.
- Open jam sessions go all weekend on the club’s river deck. Hang out, learn, share, laugh, and meet like-minded musicians from all over Australia.
The spontaneity of this style means you never know exactly what you’re going to get.
But it’s always pure, honest music filled with zest and flair.
Are you fascinated by fast fingers on an acoustic guitar or violin?
Would you enjoy an accordion serenade in a café on a cobbled street in France?
Does your foot tap along to tunes?
Then you’ll be right at home at this festival.
Manouche jazz is highly inclusive. You’re welcome whether you’re:
- a new musician or hardcore veteran
- a player or a listener
- student or professional
- guitarist, violinist or bass player
Why there’s a manouche jazz festival
The Australian patron of this festival, Ian Date, was the first to introduce this distinctly European form of jazz in Australia. His passion for it was caught by Ewan MacKenzie, a Brisbane-based guitarist on the blues scene in the early 2000s. Influence from both musicians fanned a flame that spearheaded OzManouche. The festival now attracts visitors nationwide.
The late Ewan MacKenzie passed the baton to Cameron Jones, a fervent manouche jazz performer. Cameron now honours MacKenzie’s memory through the ongoing expansion of the festival. His vision is to pass on the vibrancy and passion of manouche jazz to the next generation, and to provide a more prominent platform for female musicians in this genre.
by brisjazzclub | Mar 18, 2022
Brisbane Vocal Jazz Festival 9th – 13th October 2024
The jazz voice is a powerful instrument
The voice is a primal force, the original instrument. There’s nowhere in Australia that celebrates it like this festival does. The success of this festival promotes the jazz club as an unmissable tourist destination and a key venue local and for touring artists.
Dive into a showcase of storytelling through the jazz voice
- Listen to creative spins on popular songs as vocalists dig deep into popular jazz standards, reinvent contemporary songs or share original music.
- Enjoy a range of vocal milestones, from the freshness of youth to the established timbres of the masters.
- Experience jazz voices that move you to a place where everything feels right. Warm vocal tones drip over you like honey, textured tunes fill you with longing, and witty words wrapped in melody make you want to dance.
You’ll walk away with a fresh perspective on the voice as an instrument equal to any other in jazz music.
The program
In early August each year, this festival hosts:
- Top quality national and international artists performing alongside local talent at Brisbane Jazz Club.
- Four to five days of performances that showcase unique voices and techniques.
Who is the festival for?
If you love a capella music or you’re a budding jazz singer, you’ll love the skills featured in this festival. Or if you simply enjoy listening to powerful vocal folds or voice acrobatics, this is not one to miss.
Why there’s a vocal jazz festival
Jazz Singers’ Jazz Night at the club grew from strength to strength, becoming something of a legacy over 20 years. Its popularity demanded a more visible platform with a wider audience. Launched in 2016, The Brisbane Vocal Jazz Festival was the obvious next step. Artistic director Ingrid James initiated it with a team of jazz-loving volunteers. In 2024, this festival celebrates its 9th anniversary. The Brisbane Vocal Jazz Festival’s acclaim reaches beyond the jazz community to both mainstream and specialist audiences and celebrates diversity!
