Jazz In The City

Venues around Lancaster will host new, exciting and sometimes surprising musical performances this month, writes Louise Bryning

- Louise Bryning

Many people have a pre-conceived notion of jazz. But whether you’re an aficionado or a newcomer the chances are you’ll be surprised by some of the sounds in Lancaster this month.

Lancaster Jazz Festival will see the premiere of Northern, a performance incorporating the noises of Lancaster, Manchester and Barrow with improvised harmonies on the cello. As part of the piece, a Dukes theatre audience can expect to hear the rhythms of a coffee roaster from Atkinsons in Lancaster merge with the hiss of the M6 traffic.

They were among the sounds recorded during a 12-month residency in the area by the internationally acclaimed composer and cellist, Maja Bugge in collaboration with sound designer, Adam York Gregory and sound and visual artist, Hervé Perez.

Supporting artists to create new and original music all year round is a central aim of Lancaster Jazz Festival, a not-for-profit organisation now in its eighth year, run by a small team of freelance staff and volunteers, the majority of whom are musicians.

This year’s festival runs from September 11-15 with Northern’s premiere on the 14th.

Festival manager, Lucy Woolley, said: ‘Lancaster has a great cultural community who are interested in local and national arts and people travel from near and far to experience this community come together in September to celebrate jazz. Last year we had more than 5,000 people through our events and this is growing year on year.