History

“Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. They teach you there’s a boundary line to music. But, man, there’s no boundary line to art.”

— Charlie Parker

Ask a hundred people to define jazz and you’ll get three hundred answers. Some will talk about its West African pedigree or its origins at the confluence of African and European music. Some will discuss its use of blue notes or its fertile opportunities for performer interaction and improvisation. Some will focus on any one of its many subgenres – from New Orleans Dixieland to bebop to fusion and beyond. Some will hesitate, unwilling to venture into a seemingly unknown territory, having been taught that jazz belongs to a select group of music enthusiasts or ‘intellectuals’.

But jazz is more than a definition. It is, as Charlie Parker suggests, alive. It’s individual, it’s universal and it’s continually evolving. It adopts and adapts other musical cultures as it moves around the world. It’s a living manifestation of democratic creativity – for performers and audiences alike. It’s a quintessentially American art form.

The Burlington Discover Jazz Festival began as a way to celebrate not only jazz’s breadth but also the Vermont performers who were contributing to its continual evolution. Twenty-six years later it has grown into an opportunity for world-renowned artists, local and regional performers and burgeoning student musicians to thrill us, connect us and make us appreciate what a powerful force live music is. They help us redefine jazz.