Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
Veteran favorites and fresh faces filled the crowd and stage on the show's last night.
By EILEEN SCHULTE
© St. Petersburg Times, published October 21, 2002
CLEARWATER -- The 23rd annual Clearwater Jazz Holiday ended Sunday on a smooth note with the laid-back sounds of Jes' Grew, the Mike MacArthur Group and Steve Reid's Bamboo Forest -- followed by headliners Lou Rawls and Jonathan Butler.
"It's been fantastic," said Markus Tauchmann -- a consultant from Zurich, Switzerland -- who was attending the festival for the first time. "I liked Deanna Bogart. She was very emotional. I don't like Chick Corea's music, but he was good. Also, it was very well-organized. You see people sitting here, enjoying their lives. You can tell they like being here."
Some Jazz Holiday regulars agreed.
"I've loved every single band, although today isn't exactly what you'd say was (music of) the jazz genre," said Tony Samson, who has attended the event for 18 straight years.
No matter. Thousands of music enthusiasts braved traffic snarls and purse searches especially to see Rawls, who flew in from Pittsburgh to sing at the festival. He arrived in a maroon van with dark windows 45 minutes before his one hour and fifteen minute performance.
Wearing a tan suit with a vest and a gold chain knotted around his neck, he sat under the VIP tent warmly greeting fans and getting kissed by women while Steve Reid's Bamboo Forest wrapped up their set.
"I love (outdoor festivals)," he said, smiling. "It's free for the people. The people are relaxed. You don't have to go far to get them in the groove. They're already in the groove."
He said he never gets tired of singing classics like You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine, a song he performed Sunday.
"I never get bored with it," he said. "How can you get bored with music?"
Although the four-day event didn't break any attendance records this year, an estimated crowd of 11,000 turned out to see Chick Corea and his Elektric Band on Saturday night.
"The crowd went nuts," said Wayne Garcia, president of the Jazz Holiday Foundation. "They were on an electric high. The Chick Corea Elektric Band is like a 'super group.' For Clearwater to get them, it was very fortunate."
Although Garcia said he sold more beers than last year, he didn't have the final tally on how much merchandise or how many $25 preferred seats were sold.
Some Jazz Holiday veterans weren't too pleased to see hundreds of seats remain empty during most of the event.
"They've got 500 seats in the preferred seating section," said Samson, a former Jazz Holiday volunteer. "That and the VIP seating didn't approach capacity last night. They should (cut it in half). I wouldn't move closer, but a lot of people would."
And he had another gripe.
"We would rather pay $10 or $15 a day and let us bring coolers," he said.
But he had no complaints about the music.
"The talent this year has been stupendous," Samson said.