Edmonds Center Hosts Benefit Concert for Edmonds-Woodway Jazz Ensemble Tonight

Edmonds-Woodway Jazz Ensemble I is one of the 15 finalist bands invited to the prestigious 18th Annual Essentially Ellington (EE) High School Jazz Band Competition & Festival held at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Beginning on May 10, finalist bands will compete for top honors and participate in workshops, jam sessions, and more during the three-day EE competition & festival in New York City.

Featured artists at this Benefit Concert will include the award winning Edmonds-Woodway Jazz Ensembles, College Place Middle School Jazz Band and Director Jake Bergevin's Javatown Swing Orchestra featuring Jim Sisko (trumpet), Travis Ranney (tenor sax) and John Sanders (piano). Mr. Bergevin is an accomplished trumpeter and vocalist in his own right and his band plays throughout the region. Frank DeMiero will emcee the event. For lovers of Jazz and Swing, this will be an event to remember.

Jake Bergevin, the bands' director said, "we are thrilled to be invited back to New York to play as finalists in the prestigious Essentially Ellington Competition for the 4th time. Our band is especially good this year with many outstanding seniors and soloists. We recently returned from the Lionel Hampton Jazz Festival with many outstanding soloist and group awards. These students work very seriously on their instruments and rehearse each day at 6:30 AM. Parents also make many sacrifices for their students, so being selected as finalists is a great acknowledgement of all this hard work. I'm grateful to my friends and associates for participating as they know what a big impact this trip will be for our EW Jazz students. Big thanks to Frank DeMiero for volunteering to emcee this big concert at the Edmonds Center for the Arts."

The cost to send the Edmonds-Woodway Jazz Band per student is approximately $1,400 for 6 days and 5 nights in New York, and net proceeds from this benefit will help to offset the group's travel expenses. "ECA is proud to be support the Edmonds-Woodway Jazz program," stated Joe McIalwain, ECA's Executive Director. "We hope the community will come out to see the kids perform on the ECA stage and help them raise the funds needed to compete at Essentially Ellington! This is another great example of how the Edmonds community can come together to make something special happen.

In preparation for the trip in May, Jazz at Lincoln Center will send, free of charge, a professional jazz musician to Edmonds-Woodway High School in April to lead an intensive day- long workshop of rehearsals, lessons, and master classes to help prepare for their trip. The free clinics are part of the rich 18-year history of Lincoln Center's unique music education program, which, by the end of this school year, will have reached more than 450,000 students in more than 4,000 high schools across all 50 United States, Canada, and American schools abroad.

Edmonds Center for the Arts (ECA) is a non-profit performing arts facility located in picturesque downtown Edmonds, Washington. Housed in the historic original Edmonds High School building, ECA was remodeled and opened in October 2006 to be a cultural resource for the Puget Sound region through performing arts presentations, community partnerships and education outreach programs.