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Chazzfest: Destination soul
Organizers hope Chazzfest rivals New Orleans music festival
By Dennis Quick
Senior Staff Writer
The two-day Charleston Music & Heritage Festival, dubbed Chazzfest, debuts Sept. 15, and the event could be the start of something big.
The festival’s organizers certainly hope so. They intend Chazzfest to be an annual happening whose popularity could rival The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, which has been rocking every year since its premiere in 1970.
“This could become a major festival in the next two years,” said Chazzfest co-organizer Grace Bouldin, a partner with Sullivan’s Island-based production and promotional company Sound Events.
The Family Circle Tennis Center on Daniel Island will host Chazzfest, billed as a celebration of Charleston’s musical heritage. Tickets cost $35 in advance, $45 at the gate, and are on sale now. Students and children get discounts.
Charleston-based Digital Lifestyle Outfitters, which creates accessories for the Apple iPod, is the event’s presenting sponsor.
Legendary soul singer Al Green will headline about 16 rock, blues, jazz, rhythm and blues, bluegrass, funk, hip-hop and beach music performers.
Local chefs will showcase she-crab soup, shrimp and grits and other Lowcountry delicacies while regional artists and artisans will display their creations.
The organizers anticipate about 10,000 music lovers from North Carolina to Florida will attend the event.
Such a turnout could thrust Charleston into the Southeast’s, and possibly the nation’s, musical spotlight and eventually elevate the Lowcountry to a good-time destination rivaling New Orleans,
Chazzfest organizers said.
In 2003, the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, which occurs over two consecutive spring weekends and features New Orleans cuisine as well as music, attracted 503,000 attendees, nearly 217,000 of them out-of-towners, and generated a $300 million economic impact for the Crescent City, according to the New Orleans Convention & Visitors Bureau.
Rick Jones, president of Wadmalaw Island-based marketing consultancy FishBait Marketing, and Bouldin came up with the idea for the music festival about four years ago. They agreed the Lowcountry needed a major festival that would invigorate the area during the tourism season’s slower months and do for Charleston what the New Orleans music festival does for the Big Easy.
“Charleston has just as rich a music and food heritage as New Orleans,” Bouldin noted.
Jones, Bouldin, Bouldin’s Sound Event’s partner Paul Chanon, former Music Farm owner Riddick Lynch and Rob Lamble, president of Mount Pleasant-based production and promotion company Ear For Music, got together to hammer out the festival’s details.
They searched for a Lowcountry venue large enough to accommodate all the performers and the anticipated crowd and also offered plenty of free parking. Daniel Island’s Family Circle Tennis Center met the criteria.
The venue will include four stages and a “vendor village” where chefs and artists can sell their goods to attendees.
Then there was the task of luring well-known performers.
“Being a first-time event, it was a challenge getting big names,” said Lynch.
Scheduling the event so that it did not compete with established, nationally known music festivals helped the
Chazzfest organizers attract performers such as Southern rock band Drive-By Truckers, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Buddy Guy, modern bluegrass pioneer Sam Bush, jazz group The Karl Denson Trio and other top musicians.
The organizers lured Rock and Roll Hall of Famer Al Green away from a Minnesota gig he was considering by appealing to the Arkansas-born singer’s Southern roots and by offering him a handsome paycheck, Lynch said. The amount was not disclosed.
Chazzfest is priced to appeal to music lovers of different income levels, Jones pointed out.
“We want a diverse crowd,” he said. “We don’t want to price anyone out.”
Festival proceeds will benefit Save the Music, which promotes music programs in public schools, and Charleston’s forthcoming International African American Museum.
Dennis Quick is senior staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dquick@charlestonbusiness.com.
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