The Savannah Music Festival(SMF) is Georgia's largest musical arts festival. The festival is a cross-genre event that celebrates both the musical heritage of the South and international musicians. The festival is held annually over eighteen consecutive days in the springtime in Savannah, Georgia. The event showcases the intimate venues of historical downtown Savannah, and also commissions new musical works specifically performed for the festival.
The Festival was founded in 1988 as an effort by community leaders to increase cultural tourism in Savannah and its surrounding area. Originally known as "Savannah Onstage International Arts Festival," the festival staged music, dance and film programs that attracted audiences primarily from the coastal Southeastern United States. During its fourth year, the organization launched its programmatic centerpiece, the American Traditions Vocal Competition, which still attracts talent from all over North America.
The organization was renamed "Savannah Music Festival" in 2002, and began focusing its artistic scope to spotlight the musical arts. The financial impact of the festival on the city of Savannah is now second only to the annual St. Patrick’s Day Celebration.
The Savannah Music Festival provides supplemental arts education programs to nearly 20,000 students annually. Artist are engaged to teach master classes and workshops, exposing patrons to breakout studies of different strains of music, music history and dance.
Before the 2006 festival, the Georgia Music Educators Association contacted SMF to discuss connecting festival jazz performers with regional high school jazz students. The jazz band workshop that year brought bands from Georgia and South Carolina, and established a format that contributing clinician James Ketch, Director of Jazz Studies at UNC Chapel Hill, describes as completely unique: the concerted participation of a team of world-class jazz musicians working closely with a group of students.
In 2007, bands from four different southeastern states registered for the weekend intensive, putting students together with master musicians and educators, including Marcus Roberts, Roland Guerin, Jason Marsalis, Wycliffe Gordon, Dave Stryker, Ketch and others. Each band played on an open-air stage in Savannah’s City Market, a major tourist thoroughfare. At the end of the weekend an honors band was selected to open for John Pizzarelli and the New York All-Star Big Band at the Lucas Theatre.
The Savannah Music Festival regularly collaborates with organizations including the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD); Telfair Museum of Art; Georgia Music Hall of Fame, Savannah Tour of Homes and Gardens; Savannah Economic Development Authority; City of Savannah; Savannah Area Convention and Visitors Bureau; Georgia Department of Economic Development; a cross-section of the city's houses of worship; shopping district merchants; and other music and community groups.