On the eve of July 2023, the jazz-loving residents of Dunakeszi could take part in a fantastic musical performance, IV. King Béla at the Jam Jazz Festival on the main square. The two-day event began on Saturday, July 15 at 6:30 p.m. with a performance by the Gábor Kollmann Quintet, and then Swing à la Django – featuring Kozma Orsi, Juli Horányi and Bálint Magyar – took the stage. The evening ended with Focus Acoustic. At 11 a.m. on Sunday, Erika Náray awaited the little ones with her children’s show, and in the early evening SwingGirls and Feri Varga performed. The festival ended with a rousing concert by the Cotton Club Singers.
Erika Náray’s career in theatre, film and dubbing is known to everyone, but perhaps less people know that she graduated from the Jazz department of the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music and considers the popularization of the genre to be her passion. That’s why she became the hostess of the festival seven years ago.
– What makes this task still exciting for you? – I asked the actress.
– I am always confronted here with the endless amount of young talent that I have not played with yet, on the other hand I can meet very nice colleagues with whom we cannot go to each other’s concerts and here I can finally get a glimpse of where they are in their careers.
– Why do you feel it is important to be an active part of this event that moves the local community?
– I’ve already been to many places in the country with theater productions and bands, and my heart beats at every location where I feel that the organizer wants real culture. Here, the city government and the organizers want a quality festival. There is live music, a wonderful venue and an understanding audience. Everyone can find the trend and style that is closest to them.
– What makes this year’s festival different for you?
– Now I perform with a jazz program for children, where I don’t sing children’s songs, but we try to bring the genre a little closer to them, to make them fall in love with swinging and Latin songs. Also, we jazz up Hungarian hits that are easy to learn and they can sing along with. For example, the title song of the show is “Tell me when I sing loudly!”. In the meantime, we will introduce the instruments and teach them how to clap to the right beat. I think the fact that this festival has accepted that it is also aimed at children is a fantastic initiative – said Erika Náray.
The children’s program, which is child-centric but also engaging for adults, was a valuable highlight of the festival.
I asked the other host of the program series, municipal representative Krisztián Pethő, about what this event means to him.
– Basically, I like jazz music, I also listen to it in the car, so I was happy to say yes to the invitation of the Dunakeszi Program Office in 2019. I have been hosting the festival ever since. Dunakeszi is a colorful city, it tries to provide suitable programs for everyone. The jazz festival, initiated and organized by the Program Office, is an event that serves the needs of a relatively narrow group, but is all the more popular. This is an extremely complex program, consisting of many sub-tasks. A familiar, fantastic team works to make this event a reality, starting with setting up the tents, transporting the furniture, finding the performers, contacting the vendors, and then packing and cleaning. It’s a huge job for the organizers as well – Krisztián Pethő said.
– What does the name Jam Jazz refer to? – I asked.
“Jamming” or “joyful music” is one of the characteristics of jazz, hence the name of this event. I think it absolutely suits it, just like this elegant environment here on the main square. Similar events are not organized in the surrounding agglomeration, so people from neighboring settlements are also happy to visit here.
At the festival, we could experience how much the children enjoyed Erika Náray’s show. They sang, danced and imbibed jazz without noticing. As adults, we can be grateful to the organizers because we were able to see high-quality programs again and we were filled with joy by the joyful music of the performers. And no one told us if we sang loudly.
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Photo: Krisztián Tóta
