Charlie Parker Jazz Festival

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The Charlie Parker Jazz Festival in New York City will mark its 15th anniversary in August of 2007. Presented by City Parks Foundation, the free festival celebrates Parker, his musical legacy, and the neighborhoods of Harlem and the Lower East Side where Parker himself lived and worked.

The two-day festival is held each August in Historic Harlem’s Marcus Garvey Park and the Lower East Side’s Tompkins Square Park. Distinguished musicians performing at the festival reflect Parker’s influence in jazz, including his rhythmic and harmonic inventions, offering inspired musical creations with roots in the work of a jazz great.

Performers at the 2005 and 2006 Charlie Parker Jazz Festivals included the Odean Pope Saxophone Choir, Geri Allen, John Hicks with David “Fathead” Newman, George Coleman, Sonny Fortune Quartet, Greg Osby, Dewey Redman, JoAnne Brackeen Quartet, Ray Mantilla, and David Sanchez.

The New York Times has declared about the festival that “few jazz events in the city are as community-minded…[it’s] the jazz scene at its best…a concert for neighborhood audiences and the musicians.”

More information about the festival is available at City Parks Foundation's web site [1]