Seven new musical performances by renowned jazz artists, live-streamed conversations with Angela Davis and Clint Eastwood, plus socially distanced watch parties are on deck for the 63rd annual Monterey Jazz Festival this year when it goes digital Sept. 25-27.
Among the artists presenting new streaming concerts are Our Native Daughters, which consists of Rhiannon Giddens, Leyla McCalla, Amythyst Kiah and Allison Russell; the Gerald Clayton Quartet; and pianist Christian Sands, the festival’s 2020 artist in residence.
The schedule also includes a live cooking demonstration by singer-songwriter Lila Downs, along with hours of archived performances from past festivals hosted on several stages at the Monterey County Fairgrounds.
Highlights of the archival material include sets by Dianne Reeves, Herbie Hancock, the Kenny Barron Trio and Regina Carter, as well as musical tributes to Quincy Jones, Sonny Rollins and Dave Brubeck.
The online events will stream on the festival’s YouTube channel from 5 to 7 p.m. each day, hosted by Artistic Director Tim Jackson and other special guests.
While free to view, organizers are soliciting donations that will be divided among the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and the featured artists.
“We had a lot of artists offering to volunteer their time and services, which was gratifying,” said festival Deputy Director Elizabeth Welden‐Smith. “But at the same time, we thought, ‘We have to support these artists.’ ”
In an effort to re-create the vibe of the annual event, a socially distanced watch party will be hosted at Casa Munras, which Welden‐Smith said would be in keeping with restaurant protocols — outside dining, no more than four guests per table. There will also be drive-in watch parties at the Monterey County Fairgrounds and the Monterey Marriott, which are the major hubs for the in-person festival that attracts about 40,000 jazz fans every year.
The Monterey Jazz Festival is the most recent in a string of music festivals forced by the COVID-19 pandemic to shift their activities online.
Stern Grove Festival canceled all of its in-person concerts and instead presented a weekly series of archived concerts from the festival’s past 13 years, while BottleRock Napa Valley replaced its May live offerings with a virtual concert series that extends to Oct. 2.
More recently, in August, the Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival was replaced by Inside Lands. The two-day virtual festival hosted on Twitch saw more than 3.2 million unique viewers, according to a data report.
Monterey Jazz Virtual Festival Lineup
Friday, Sept. 25
- Herbie Hancock
- Dianne Reeves
- Roy Hargrove & RH Factor
- Terri Lyne Carrington – Mosaic Project
- Christian McBride & Inside Straight
- Jamie Cullum
- 2020 Monterey Jazz Festival artist-in-residence Christian Sands
- 2020 Next Generation Jazz Orchestra directed by Gerald Clayton
Saturday, Sept. 26
- Diana Krall
- Tribute to Dave Brubeck — Cannery Row Suite featuring Kurt Elling and Roberta Gambarini
- Kenny Barron Trio
- Regina Carter
- Our Native Daughters — Rhiannon Giddens, Amythyst Kiah, Leyla McCalla, Allison Russell
- Clint Eastwood in conversation, hosted by Tim Jackson
- Berklee Institute of Jazz & Gender Justice Quintet — founder and Director Terri Lyne Carrington
- 2020 Next Generation Women in Jazz Combo directed by Katie Thiroux
- 2020 Next Generation Jazz Orchestra directed by Gerald Clayton
Sunday, Sept. 27
- Tribute to Quincy Jones, “The A&M Years,” featuring Hubert Laws and Valerie Simpson
- Sonny Rollins Tribute featuring Jimmy Heath, Joe Lovano, Branford Marsalis and Joshua Redman
- Anat Cohen Tentet
- 2012 MJF on Tour with Musical Director Christian McBride and Dee Dee Bridgewater on vocals
- 2018 MJF on Tour with Musical Director Christian Sands and Cécile McLorin Salvant on vocals
- Gerald Clayton Quartet
- Angela Davis in conversation with Terri Lyne Carrington
- Lila Downs
- 2020 Next Generation Jazz Orchestra directed by Gerald Clayton