KOKTEBEL, September 12 (RIA Novosti) - Organizers of the international Koktebel Jazz Party, which is kicking off in Crimea, said on Friday that this year's festival will be very different from past events.
Head of the Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency Dmitry Kiselev told RIA Novosti that it was difficult to organize the event because of Crimea's reunification with Russia.
"This is a complicated event for everyone, because on March 18 Crimea reunited with Russia. It was difficult for the team, consisting of my Ukrainian friends, to organize anything in Crimea, and another festival, Jazz Koktebel, moved to Odessa Region, where it opened yesterday. I wish success to my friends. The more jazz festivals the better," Kiselev noted at a press conference devoted to the festival on Friday, adding that it had been a tough task to arrange the event in such a short time span.
"This is a very happy day for me, because I initiated this jazz festival, and can rightly be considered its founding father. This will be the 12th velvet jazz season in Koktebel," Kiselev noted.
The festival, organized by Rossiya Segodnya, will take place on September 12-15, and is to be attended by some of the best jazz bands from Russia, Brazil, the United States, Israel, Britain, India, Armenia, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. Tickets will be sold on the main stage, with all profits going to the benefit of Crimea.
"Rossiya Segodnya organized this festival, using extra-budgetary funds with support from the Ministry of Culture. It is part of the Year of Culture in the Russian Federation," Kiselev said, and thanked the team that organized the festival.
According to Koktebel Jazz Party Art Director Mikhail Ikonnikov, this year's festival is very different from those of the past few years.
"The program is extensive, with the festival lasting for four days … Compared with past festivals, ours has more jazz. I think previous ones were more oriented toward bubblegum music. This time we're doing a serious jazz program," he said.
The other Art Director, Sergei Golovnya, agreed with Ikonnikov. "I'm happy to say that the Koktebel Jazz Party will be attended by many jazzmen. In the past there was just the name "jazz," but we had fusion, rock music and even pop songs," he said.
The International Jazz Quintet of Yakov Okun and Deborah Brown, Valery Ponomaryov and "the We Remember Art Blakey" sextet, Tom Harrell and the Jamal Thomas Band are among the festival's headliners. Another venue of the festival will be devoted to young talent, and the Voloshin House-Museum will host classic blues and jazz performers.
The main stage, located right on the beach, will host some of the most brilliant jazz stars, including the Pyotr Vostokov Big Jazz Orchestra, the Anton Gorbunov quintet, Andrei Kondakov and the Brazil All Stars, Denis Shvytov and the Silver Woman project, Anna Klesun and the Esh band, Vladimir Ivanov and the Ornithology band, the Ivan Farmakovsky quartet, the Alex Hutchings Band, the Khuun-Khuur Tu band, the Vaagn Airapetyan quartet and Anna Buturlina, the Club des Belugas, the JVL Big Band, the festival's organizer Sergei Golovnya and Karina Kozhevnikova.
