Jazz Education

While the Wichita Jazz Festival is proud of its concert productions, our long-term goal is to help raise the next generation of jazz musicians in the greater Wichita area. As music education moves increasingly out of public schools and limited educational resources necessitate a focus on large-ensemble music, the opportunities for young musicians to learn about small-group jazz – the creative lifeblood of jazz in the last seventy years – have become few and far between. This gap in jazz education causes other lost opportunities for young musicians as well, including experience improvising, composing, and the chance to foster other basic – and employable – musical skills.

Our Boogie Academy program seeks to supplement existing school music education programs by placing a professional jazz musician in area middle schools to provide advanced instruction for talented young musicians. With these professional musicians -- Jazz Paras -- students will learn the basics of jazz improvisation, theory, and coordinating a small group. Students can then return to their original ensembles with a greater degree of confidence and understanding, providing an example for their fellow students and feeling more empowered as a creative individual. 

This program was piloted with four schools last spring and was received enthusiastically by both students and educators. We'll be continuing this program throughout the 2011-12 school year, hoping to expand our reach among Wichita area schools.  

In addition to working with the school system, the Wichita Jazz Festival seeks to provide educational events for the community at large. These events, which focus on both individual and group instruction in both technical and conceptual areas, take place at local community centers and are open to students of all ages. In the past, creativity workshops in this series have been hosted by international artists such as Lionel Loueke, Gretchen Parlato, Nicole Mitchell, and Linda Oh.

We're currently in development of the 2011-2012 Jazz in the Neighborhood series, which will focus on the heritage of Hispanic music in jazz. This will culminate in a workshop with saxophonist Miguel Zenon as part of our 2012 annual festival.