Jazz and Happy Music at the 10th anniversary of the Cambridge Jazz Festival.
We went to the Cambridge Jazz Festival last weekend to enjoy the music and blue sky day. Run by the Cambridge Jazz Foundation, it connects the community with weekend long activities of music, art, food and exploration.
This was our first time attending this particular jazz festival which has been continuously held at the spacious Dehaly Park. It was there that I met Dana Royster.
She was holding up a book – Happy Music – with a smile to match. Happy Music, is Dana Royster’s children’s book about a 1940s jazz venue in New Orleans. The semi autobiographical story is wonderfully written at a kids level about the influence of New Orleans Jazz music. This was our shared thread because I had just finished a recent photography show at See Saw Gallery that displayed a favorite subject of mine, the power of music to connect.
Yes, music is a powerful communicator that is its own universal language. Jazz made its impact on me as a kid. Musicians have been among my best teachers. In the bio that accompanied my show, I spoke about how as a ten year old, sitting on a bale of hay in Preservation Hall, I was completely entranced by the music and the players. This was long before a traveling Preservation Jazz Hall band hit the road.
Dana and I started talking about roots and childhood and Jazz.
She has a connection to the same birthplace of music that started my lifelong interest in jazz.
“New Orleans”, she said.
“Preservation Hall,” I answered.
Right there and then the image came back to me. Dark evening, dimly lit street. Short line as the wrought iron gates swung open. Me, a 10 year old sitting on a bale of hay listening as each instrument came alive.
“N’orleans,” she exclaimed.
Club Desire nurtured the growth of Jazz
“My grandfather Charles Armstead started a club in N’orleans called Club Desire. Fats Domino got his start there. My grandfather got him his first car so he could play at the club and he wasn’t the only one my grandpa helped”.
Indeed, under Armstead’s leadership, Club Desire hosted the likes of Count Basie, Billy Eckstine and Ray Charles. Located at 2604 Desire Street in New Orleans 9th Ward, Armstead opened the club on Mardi Gras in 1948 and ran it until his death in 1954. These were the early days of rhythm and blues taking hold of America and the precursor to Rock & Roll.
Dana Buefort Royster, is a retired public school teacher turned author and tour host. She shares wonderful stories her mother told her about her grandfather and his place in jazz history for providing what we’d now call startup incubator space for jazz musicians to evolve. Her book Happy Music is a kids version of the foundational jazz related stories she experienced. Among her many gifts is her ability to build community and welcome a new generation of adults and children to the world of jazz music.
Cambridge Jazz Festival
Cambridge Jazz Festival launched through the combined talents and efforts of former Cambridge City Councillor Larry Ward, and Ron Savage, Dean of the Professional Performance Division at Berklee College of Music. Both these gentlemen shared a passion and vision of creating a jazz festival in Cambridge. You can read the full history here. I have found Cambridge Massachusetts is filled with visionaries that make things happen in science, medicine and the arts.
THE CAMMY Awards
The CAMMY awards celebrate local folks who make a difference.Officially, the award is in recognition of an individual’s ‘commitment to musical performance, education and mentoring. I met up briefly with one of this year’s winners, Ron Reid. He is a multi-instrumentalist celebrating his rich Caribbean heritage. Bassist, steel drummer, composer and educator. He has a passion for creating music and teaches at Berklee College of Music in Boston. His smile and his music says it all.
