Jazz returned to Barcelona in a big way this past September, with the annual four-day music event called Jazzing Festival — or simply, Jazzing. It was the eighth such Jazzing, created by and featuring (Mr.) Joan Chamorro and the Sant Andreu Jazz Band. The concerts, workshops, and jam sessions featured the SAJB itself, plus several of its distinguished alumni, as well as a number of invited guest musicians and singers—as has been the custom since the first Jazzing in 2014 (no less a legend than tenor saxophonist Scott Hamilton has been an honored guest on many SAJB projects; he returned after being forced to stay away last year by Covid travel restrictions).
What makes Jazzing — and indeed the SAJB itself — so significant, so enjoyable, and so important in today’s jazz world?
Firstly, the SAJB is no ordinary big band; it is comprised of children and teenagers. From the project’s inception, some of the musicians through the years have joined as young as eight years old (and, in some cases, even younger), with most of them customarily leaving when they reach the age of 21 or thereabouts. As attested by those who have discovered the band either at concerts or on YouTube, the most astonishing element to all of this is that these young people sound as skilled, polished, and creative as the classic big bands and legendary musicians they emulate, from the 1930s,’40
