The Festival calendar listing all gigs and venues is available for download here. Or click through ‘The Artists’, ‘Full Program’ and ‘Special Events’ in the sidebar to the right

Full 2009 MJFF program is now available at the usual venues.

Bookings are now open for Big Arse Sunday here

Volunteers are also required to help out for Big Arse Sunday. If you are interested, please email info@melbournejazzfringe.com

Bookings are now open for the APRA Composer’s Commission Concert here and special student tickets are now available

For further information please email info@melbournejazzfringe.com

The Melbourne Jazz Fringe Festival was formed in 2005 to celebrate Melbourne’s burgeoning creative jazz scene. Now established as a leading event in the Melbourne cultural calendar, the 2009 festival will again make the ears prick up, the heart soar, and let the mind be gloriously surprised. It will feature some of Australia’s most celebrated improvisers in an inspiring ten days and nights of creative and groundbreaking music making.

The 2009 Jazz Fringe Festival kicks off at Iwaki Auditorium at ABC Southbank on May 8th at 7.30pm with the APRA Commission Concert featuring a new work by celebrated Melbourne composer and guitarist Ren Walters. “Surrounded by C” is for voice artist, 3 brass instruments, small percussive objects, and real-time manipulation and amplification with focus on placements of sounds in the space using a 5.1 surround sound system. The key performers are voice artist Carolyn Connors and percussionist Dur-e Dara. The concert also features singer Gian Slater with the Silo String Quartet. Gian recorded her latest album ‘Creatures at the crossroads’ with the virtuosic pianist, Will Poskitt, who tragically passed away late last year. Gian has re arranged selections from the album for the Silo String Quartet.

The innovative “New Standards” night on Saturday May 9th at Uptown Jazz Cafe will feature three ensembles: Ashley Cross & Rob Vincs, Adam Simmons solo and Carl Pannuzzo & Penny Larkins with Jesse Mac, reinterpreting the music of their favourite Australian composers including Paul Simmons, Brian Brown, John Martyn and Paul Kelly. Tickets for this ‘one-off’ event are strictly limited and bookings are advised. A new event this year is the “Frisell” night at Uptown Jazz Café on Wednesday May 13th and will highlight music inspired or written by Bill Frisell. The night will feature three stellar groups: Frank Di Sario and Luke Howard, Fall 10x and Jacqueline Gawler with Fran Swinn and Tamara Murphy.

The program also includes performances at Bennetts Lane, 303, La Mama, Bar Open, The Abbotsford Convent and 3RRR performance studio. These are all venues committed to nurturing Melbourne’s creative jazz scene. Come and hear the musicians that are responsible for Melbourne’s reputation as the cultural capital of creative music in the Southern Hemisphere: Andrea Keller and Geoff Hughes, the launch of extempore Issue 2 with Allan Browne’s “free ensemble”, Anemone, 12 Tone Diamonds, Noriko Tadano and Gerry Hale, the Zoe Frater Quintet, the Launch of Downstream Music records and many more.

In 2009 The Festival will feature both BIG ARSE and SHORT ARSE Sundays. From 3-11pm on Sunday May 10th at The Fitzroy Bowls Club, Big Arse Sunday listeners will kick back to artists including Aunty Richard (Syd), The Vanguards, Form X, Kewti, Ball-Magnusson-Talia and many more.. Tickets are limited. Book now for an afternoon and evening of wonderful strangeness, deep groove, dissonance, melody, cacophony and the beauty of song. On Sunday May 17th the Melbourne Jazz Fringe winds up with the best party in town Short Arse Sunday …featuring the dynamic Alcohotlicks (Syd) at 303.

The 2008 Melbourne Jazz Fringe Festival is possible with the support of the
following sponsors:

Key Partners

Supporting Sponsors

For more info, email: info@melbournejazzfringe.com
Phone: Sonja Horbelt 0417-364-314

The Festival calendar listing all gigs and venues is available for download here

Full 2009 MJFF program will be available at the usual venues in April

For further information please email info@melbournejazzfringe.com

Kynan Robinson and ‘The Escalators’, MJFF08