PITT JAZZ EVENT IN DECEMBER TO INVOLVE THREE CONTINENTS

PITTSBURGH, Nov. 1 -- In an event involving three world continents, University of Pittsburgh Jazz Studies Director Nathan Davis and several legendary jazz musicians who have performed at Pitt over the years are "taking their show on the road" to the Bahia World Jazz Festival, Dec. 11-12, in the city of Salvador, Brazil. The event is

co-sponsored by the University of Ghana in West Africa.

"The University of Pittsburgh Jazz Seminar All-Stars" are Nathan Davis, saxophones; James Moody, saxophones; Abraham Laboriel, bass; Wallace Roney, trumpet; Idris Muhammad, drums, and Geri Allen, piano. (Moody, Laboriel, and Roney also will be on the Pitt campus Nov. 5-6 to participate in this year's 29th annual Pitt Jazz Seminar and Concert.)

The Bahia World Jazz Festival is patterned after the long-standing Pitt Jazz Seminar and Concert. It includes a conference on the development of jazz in Brazil and the state of jazz in the world, jazz clinics, workshops with young artists in different neighborhoods, and a panel discussion on the music business. Davis and the Pitt Jazz Seminar All-Stars will participate in these events and perform in concert Dec. 11.

"We wanted a forum where the artists come in and lecture to the public, rather than hold a clinic only for musicians," said Davis, founder of the popular and successful Pitt jazz event. "All lectures will be videotaped and audio-taped, just as we do at Pitt. I'm also helping the University of Ghana assemble a jazz archives, similar to the one we're building at Pitt."

The Bahia World Jazz Festival is sponsored by the City of Salvador, the International center for African Music and Dance at the University of Ghana, and the University of Pittsburgh, and is funded through a grant from the Ford Foundation.

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