The Festival includes concerts at various venues around Cheltenham, workshops, education & outreach projects and the established Jerwood Rising Stars series for young up-and coming performers.

Highlights include Ornette Coleman (celebrating his 75th birthday), Herbie Hancock's acoustic quartet, influential jazzers like Enrico Rava, Dave Liebman and Joshua Redman and a wealth of British singing talent such as Clare Teal, Gwyneth Herbert, Ian Shaw and the extraordinary Eska Mtungwazi.

Eska is appearing at the Town Hall on Saturday night. I saw Eska in TY's live band last year and anyone that has seen her live or, say, on the video of 'Look 4 Me' can't help but be impressed and in little doubt she is 'the new queen of UK soul'.

Those with sharp eyes at the start of the Jazz Britannia TV Shows will have seen a shot of Harry Beckett blowing his trumpet at last year's Saturday night at the Town Hall. Also on the line up were Gilles Peterson and Amp Fiddler. Fiddler and the band (including Stephanie McKay on backing vocals) were on great form. The set was brilliant as each track from the 'Waltz of a Ghetto Fly' album got a 12" extended version treatment. Mr. Fiddler is still touring and last month was on the bill of the Jakarta Jazz Festival which included James Brown.

This year's Saturday night Town Hall act is Keep It Unreal with Mr. Scruff for a 5 hour set (that's 300 minutes!). Expect the usual unusual mix of fun and eclectic tunes.

And if you can last out for Sunday night, after last year's session with TY, Leftfoot are back. This time with top broken beat gurus, Bugz in the Attic. Warning, act now as the demand will be high for this one.

Ticket prices and all gig details are available from the Brochure Request Hotline on 01242 237377 or click on the link below.

Links
Cheltenham Jazz Festival
Jerwood Rising Stars
Cheltenham Festival 2004 By Alyn Shipton" - The Times, May 04, 2004
Amp Fiddler Live Feb04
Stephanie McKay
Jakarta Jazz Festival
Bugz