Colorado Jazz Party
The Colorado Jazz Party was a series of annual traditional jazz and mainstream jazz festivals in Colorado . They started in Aspen in 1963 at the Jerome Hotel, initiated by Denver millionaire and businessman Dick Gibson and Maddie Gibson for a private party on Labor Day weekend (early September).
Because of its great success, they repeated that in 1964 in Vail (Casino Vail). Then they migrated to Colorado Springs (Broadmoor Hotel) and finally to Denver . Gibson repeated this until the 1990s (he died in 1998), at a time when jazz and especially traditional jazz was supplanted by other music styles at festivals and in clubs, especially in the 1960s. The parties at which the musicians played in jam sessions on the weekend attracted international audiences, which, however, were often put on waiting lists because of the limited space at the parties. Today, various jazz parties and festivals in Colorado and numerous other places in the USA continue the tradition of jazz parties, for example the Vail Jazz Festival.
The Colorado Jazz Parties included The World's Greatest Jazz Band by Yank Lawson and Bob Haggart (an all-star band founded on Gibson's initiative for the Jazz Parties in 1968), Cutty Cutshall , Eubie Blake , Peanuts Hucko , Bob Wilber , Carl Fontana , Bobby Hackett , Bud Freeman , Ralph Sutton , Cliff Leeman , Willie The Lion Smith , Gus Johnson , Budd Johnson , Vic Dickenson , Eddie Hubble , Teddy Wilson , Dick Hyman , Johnny Mince , Benny Carter , Clark Terry , Zoot Sims and Lou Stein .
In 1977 the film The Great Rocky Mountain Jazz Party by Vilis Lapenieks was shot about it. It starred in the film with Frank Rosolino , Ruby Braff , Zoot Sims, Clark Terry, Milt Hinton , Gus Johnson, Major Holley , Phil Woods , Eubie Blake, Jon Faddis , Bob Wilber, Kenny Davern , Pee Wee Erwin , Joe Venuti , Buddy Tate , Billy Butterfield , Tommy Flanagan , Peanuts Hucko, Trummy Young , Lucille Armstrong (wife of Louis Armstrong ), Flip Phillips , Roland Hanna , Ralph Sutton, Carl Fontana, Bucky Pizzarelli , Benny Carter, Dick Hyman , Bill Watrous , Roger Kellaway , Al Cohn , Al Gray , Budd Johnson, Buddy DeFranco , George Duvivier , Joe Newman , Ray Brown , Roy Haynes , Joe Wilder (Broadmoor Hotel 1976).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Howard Stone Jazz Party Preview: The story behind a 50-year-old Colorado jazz music tradition , Vail Daily 2012
- ^ David Meeker Jazz on Screen