Maceo Parker tops the billing in which female vocalists stand out

Excellent male & female vocalists, the best instrumentalists of the genre, up-and-coming groups, renowned & established artists, local bands, musical ensembles that link styles by means of fusion, renditions of rhythms closely related to jazz, the African touch…  all these elements make up the billing for the 28th edition of the Festival Internacional Canarias Jazz & Más Heineken featuring Maceo Parker as the star attraction, a true icon of modern music, synonymous with terms as instantly recognisable as funk or Groove. There will be three concerts featuring this incomparable performer, on Gran Canaria (18 July, Santa Ana Square), Lanzarote (19 July, Arrecife) and Tenerife (20 July, Puerto de la Cruz). Parker will be one of around 30 artists that form part of the programme at this new edition, which will be held from 5 to 21 July and once more will cover the islands of La Palma, Fuerteventura, Lanzarote, Gran Canaria & Tenerife. 

And for yet another year Africa Night will be staged (Friday 5 July, at the Pilar Square in Guanarteme) with performances by FRA! & Kyekyeku & Ghanalogue Highlife, two bands selected this year at the Vis a Vis contest, which took place in Ghana and organised by Casa África.

The presentation at a press conference was held at the Alfredo Kraus Auditorium, and was attended by Inés Jiménez (Councillor of Tourism at the Cabildo -Island Council- of Gran Canaria), Aurelio González (Deputy Secretary for Culture at the Canarian Government), Carolina Alonso (Councillor for Culture at the Santa Brígida Town Hall), Juan Jaime Martínez (Head of Culture & Education at Casa África), Aridany Rodríguez (Heineken – Brand, Sponsoring & Events Manager), Tilman Kuttenkeuler (Managing Director of the Auditorium & Theatre Foundation of LPGC) and Miguel Ramírez(Director of the Festival & Colorado Producciones).

Miguel Ramírez, director of the festival, laid emphasis on the wide variety of styles that “represent the purest facet of jazz and all those go to form part of its very own evolution” in an attempt to satisfy the tastes of all in the audience, that over the years “we have been adding to our proposal”. Among those artists confirmed for the event this year, we find a number of female vocalists & musicians, such as Karrin Allyson, Sinne Eeg & Peter Sprague, Judith Hill, Miryam Latrece Cuarteto, Carita Boronska Quartet and the local group ST Fusion, a fact that Ramírez pointed out as “a stance undertaken that we have been developing in these last few years because increasingly there are better & more groups with women in the leading role”. In addition, he expressed his gratitude to all the sponsors present and went on to invite the public to “investigate and discover all the good things there are in this year’s programme”.

To these one can add artists like the Avishai Cohen Trio, Tony DeSare, Marquis Hill Blacktet, FNF Trio featuring Lionel Loueke and Chris Cheek, Kennedy Administration, Munir Hossn Quartet, Yuri Honing Acoustic Quartet, Joel Ross, Mamas Gun… and a host of local bands, ST Fusion & Barreiro Project being among those that have been confirmed to date.

There will be around 50 concerts staged under the title of the Festival Internacional Canarias Jazz & Más Heineken; made possible for yet another year by the collaboration of the municipalities of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, San Cristóbal de La Laguna, Adeje, Puerto de la Cruz, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Santa Brígida, Puerto del Rosario & Los Llanos de Aridane; and the sponsorship of the Canarian Government and the Island Councils of Gran Canaria, Tenerife, La Palma, Fuerteventura & Lanzarote, Casa África, the Adán Martín Auditorium of Tenerife, the Auditorium & Theatre Foundation of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Theatres Leal & Guiniguada. Organised by Colorado Producciones, yet another edition has received the sponsorship of the company Heineken.