Festival-goers will again enjoy what makes Satchmo SummerFest so special - free jazz performances, delicious local cuisine in Red Bean Alley, educating seminars, children's activities, art exhibits, a "Satchmo Club Strut," a very special evening concert, a Jazz Mass and authentic second-line parade, and much more. With so many festivities planned, it's no wonder why Satchmo SummerFest has quickly become a summertime favorite and one of the Southeast Tourism Society's Top 20 Events. All events held at the Louisiana State Museum's Old U.S. Mint are free and open to the public.

Four outdoor stages on the grounds of the Mint will highlight traditional and contemporary jazz, funky New Orleans brass band music, and performances geared for kids. Traditional jazz performers this year include Armstrong protégé Chris Clifton, Kermit Ruffins, Dr. Michael White, Papa Henry Butler and Banu Gibson. New Orleans legend Ellis Marsalis, jazz innovator Donald Harrison Jr., Philip Manuel, Troy Andrews, and New Orleans Jazz Vipers will be featured on the contemporary stage, and the Brass Band Stage will display the horns of ReBirth Brass Band, Andrew Hall’s Society Brass Band, Pinettes Brass Band, Lil’ Rascals Brass Band and Tremé Brass Band, promising a real blow-out.

The free four-day seminar series includes discussions about the life of Louis Armstrong, and will feature many fascinating speakers: Ellis Marsalis, Jr., as keynote speaker; George Avakian, Armstrong’s producer at Columbia Records in the 1950s and '60s; Michael Cogswell, director of the Louis Armstrong House and Archives, Queens College, NY; John Edward Hasse, Curator of American Music at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington D.C.; Dan Morgenstern, Curator of the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University; and Michael “Mr. Jazz” Gourrier.

The event, which runs September 3-4 at the Woodlands Horse Track, will showcase 24 stellar musical acts over two days. Show organizers are prepped fill the facility's 30, 000 seats and say it's the first time the venue has hosted an event of this magnitude.

"We're really 'jazzed' to be at the Woodlands for this festival, " says Mark Valentine, event founder and himself a professional musician. "It's never been offered for an event like this, and yet it's the perfect venue for blues and jazz lovers."

Photo by Andrea Canter

Iowa City is typical of Midwest college towns—of the 60,000 residents, more than half have close ties to the University of Iowa, as students, professors, and administrative personnel. Unlike many college campuses, however, the university sprawls all over, sitting on both sides of the Iowa River with the “Old Capitol” (early Iowa statehouse) standing like a throne in the middle of the Pentacrest—five marble and limestone buildings that house classrooms and offices. It’s from the east side of Old Capitol, where shade is available to the early arrivals, that the main stage is erected each summer; it is from this crossroads of the Pentacrest that thousands of jazz fans converge to hear the best in local, regional, and national jazz, from straight-ahead bop to Latin and avant garde.