Last week, the Latvian Music Information Centre successfully included the jazz music dimension in the program of the first Riga Music Week, organizing the final of the first Young Baltic Jazz Competition and a panel discussion as part of the conference together with foreign experts and journalists.
The Young Baltic Jazz Competition received many applications from Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, and in the final on the morning of November 5 at the "conTakts" space in the Tallinn Street quarter, five participants competed for the main prize: "Blue Amber" from Lithuania, Laura Svikša, "GTA", Edīte Ozola and Sniedze Kārkliņa from Latvia. The international jury consisting of Antra Dreģe (VEF Jazz Club, festival ARĒNA, Latvia), Frank van Berkel (Bimhuis, Netherlands), Kostia Pace (Jazz Station, Belgium) and Jan Ole Otnæs (East Norwegian Jazz Center, Norway), decided to grant the main award to the flutist Sniedze Kārkliņa from Liepāja – the winner received a grant worth 1000 euros to spend on a professional studio recording. The competition was observed by jazz festival organizers in the Baltic States and journalists from Latvia and abroad.
On the morning of November 6 during the Riga Music Week conference program LMIC jazz expert, project manager Aleksandra Line led a discussion "The future of jazz: connecting the dots". In front of the attentive professional audience Frank van Berkel, Jan Ole Otnæs and Kostia Pace were discussing how neighbouring countries can cooperate within the European region, why building networks across smaller markets matters, how to find proper jazz audience and how we can learn from each other to provide a better future for the jazz industry.
Photo: Daniel Yoffe