420 Franklin St SE
Olympia
Monday, July 10th from 7 to 10 pm at Art House Designs
Come to Art House Designs at 420 Franklin St. in downtown Olympia for the closing night of the Olympia Free Jazz Festival. It will be a two-band concert featuring Lewis Jordan at Large, and the Joe Mailhot Jazz Unit.
Lewis Jordan is a performing artist, musician, poet. His most recent CD, Critcal Mass, features poetry and unbridled improvisation with his group Music at Large. He hopes that his poems and compositions evoke a spirit of resistance to outlived authority, whether it be external or internal. He creates interdisciplinary and multicultural productions and seeks out performers who strive for modes of expression that honor their traditions while speaking to the urgency of the present. Lewis will present a workshop on his music and poetry.
The Joe Mailhot Jazz Unit features the music of composer/guitarist Joe Mailhot, with Craig Hoyer on keyboards, bassist Erich Hahn, Steve Bentley on drums, Jim Pribbenow on tenor saxophone, and newest member, flautist Nancy Curtis. The JMJU draws from styles ranging among modern jazz, funk, soul, free and psychedelic. Joe Mailhot’s original compositions are inspired by jazz masters like Coltrane, Coleman, Davis, Ayler and The Art Ensemble of Chicago as well as by modern European composers like Pendercki, Crumb, and Stravinsky. Come and travel to musical soundscapes bombastic, tender, wild, beautiful, brilliant, and dark. It’s not about the music but where the music takes you.
Entrance $20
The Olympia Free Jazz Festival 2023 is a five-day festival from Thursday, July 6 through Monday, July 10 occurring at five different venues and featuring performers from all along the west coast from Vancouver BC to San Francisco.
Beginning with a house concert of solo artists at Dr. Wheelz’ Pad Thursday, on Friday night at Nicole’s Bar is followed by a music in the park event at West Central Park. Sunday at New Traditions features a Poetry and Jazz Workshop in the afternoon for poets to collaborate with musicians and a concert of Free Jazz and the Spoken Word in the evening. The closing night of the festival is at Art House Designs.
