[Dixielandjazz] The Monterey Dixieland Festival (Jazz Bash By The Bay)

[Steve Barbone]

Excerpted from the local paper. Congratulations April and David.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone

NONSTOP JAZZ MUSIC MACHINE - By JULIA REYNOLDS - Monterey Herald

They just didn't want to stop, couldn't stop, and so they kept on plunking
those bass strings and wailing on those trumpets.

Even after four full days spent playing traditional jazz of all stripes,
musicians at the 27th annual Dixieland Monterey's Jazz Bash by the Bay kept
on jamming, and now two trumpeters, a trombone and piano player and an
accordion master had squeezed into the Portola Plaza Hotel's bar.

The event's promoters said between 3,500 and 4,000 people attended the
festival at the Monterey Conference Center and scattered local venues. More
than two dozen jazz bands from the U.S. and Canada performed day and night,
starting Thursday and, by late Sunday, they didn't give any indication they
planned to stop.

"The word Dixieland sometimes denotes straw hats and banjos," said Dixieland
Monterey director David Kimball. "But it's really a broad traditional jazz
festival," he said, that includes many variations on jazz, ragtime, swing
and gospel music.

Across the hall, Igor's Jazz Cowboys took the term "broad" to a new level as
they ripped it up with western-swing-jazz-country riffs. According to the
band's publicity materials, Igor played with Benny Goodman, sang with The
New Christy Minstrels and, thanks to his jokes, was a three-time winner of
television's "The Gong Show. Just imagine Roy Rogers singing with Louis
Armstrong's band," the group's literature reads. . .

Stephonie Bryant, 34, kept watch at the door in a pink feather boa. Few
would guess she was a member of the U.S. Navy, attending classes of an
undisclosed nature at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey.

Asked if she had previously been a jazz fan, Bryant said, "Not until
yesterday." She had volunteered to work Saturday, and when someone was a
no-show on Sunday, Bryant gladly took on another day. "I'm definitely coming
back next year," the Missouri native said.

She was inspired, she said, seeing people of all ages on the dance floors
that were placed in the back of every performance room. "I really want to
take dance lessons now. Yesterday, there was a woman here who had broken her
back. She was using ballroom dancing as therapy." . . .

"I had so much fun," she said. "I told my friends, 'You're not going to
believe what I've just done.'" . . .

A number of high school students were also in attendance. They included
groups like the Raisin Babies Jazz Band from Fresno High School and the
Barkin' Dawgs Jazz Band from Lodi. David Kimball said a total of "several
hundred" teenagers attended, including students from Fitch Middle School in
Seaside and 116 students from Oakland. . .

"The musicians love coming here," he (David Kimball) said. "All the
musicians tell jokes and it's just more fun." His wife, Barbara Kimball,
said the festival's nonprofit producers strive to pay performers well and
provide them with a hospitality room for relaxing between gigs. . .

By nightfall, more than 130 volunteers would be treated to dinner at the
hotel, followed by -- yep, more live jazz and dancing.