The Blue Note Jazz Competition in Napa Valley, Calif., kicks off Friday (July 29) with host Dave Chappelle and Grammy-winning instrumentalist Robert Glasper as artist in residence.
“This pageant got here from the thread of my residency on the Blue Observe that I do each October,” Glasper says of his keep on the famed NYC jazz membership. “You may anticipate the music to be actual and sincere, created by people who find themselves pushing the envelope.”
The intimate three-day expertise will embody iconic acts like Snoop Dogg, Yasiin Bey & Talib Kweli, Maxwell, Corinne Bailey Rae, Erykah Badu, Chaka Khan and newer names on the scene like D Smoke and Alex Isley. “I’m most enthusiastic about Snoop. It’s going to be tremendous dope,” Glasper says, including, “I hope I can breathe with all the weed smoke that can positively be within the air.”
Happening on the Charles Krug Vineyard, the pageant will characteristic three levels with 12 bands per day, marking the primary outside, multi-day and multi-stage occasion for the Blue Observe Leisure Group. “The pageant capability is strictly the place I need it to be — not too huge, not too small,” says Blue Observe Leisure president Steven Bensusan. “It’s sort of mimicking our small jazz golf equipment by way of the intimacy that we hope to realize on all our levels.”
The pageant kicks off with musical collective Dinner Celebration (Terrace Martin, Robert Glasper & Kamasi Washington) and Snoop, plus a stay recording of the Midnight Miracle podcast, in partnership with subscription podcast community Luminary. After the pageant offered out in six hours, an extra day was added and a restricted quantity of three-day normal admission tickets had been made obtainable, priced at $610. “We’re hoping there’s going to be much more than what you see studying the lineup,” Bensusan says. “We anticipate a number of impromptu [performers] simply getting up onstage with different different bands, like what we do at our golf equipment.”
The Blue Observe Leisure Group at present has 10 jazz golf equipment around the globe, spanning from New York Metropolis to Milan, with plans to broaden additional into Europe, Bensusan tells Billboard. “We’re taking a look at alternatives in London and we hope to get a Los Angeles location open within the subsequent 12 months,” he provides. Blue Observe additionally plans to create an East Coast model of the Napa Valley-based pageant in future years.
Glasper, who launched his single “All Masks” alongside Jamaican-born artist Masego on Friday, says the pageant is his “playground” and a “dream come true,” including, “This pageant represents out-of-the-box issues, influencers, trailblazers — folks that don’t really feel the necessity to succumb to normality of standard music. An increasing number of of these sorts of individuals are popping up and discovering the braveness to be the artist that represents that.”
