If you’re a regular reader of this article you probably noticed the article was missing from the July and August issue. Well even I deserve a holiday. The holiday is over and it’s time to get back to business. I wish it could have been longer. In all previous issues I’ve tried to provide readers with information relative to places to visit for quality live music entertainment. July and August proved to be an exciting time in the region for lots of quality live music and great headliner concerts. I had the opportunity to check out the B.B. King concert in Lorca at the Fortaleza del Sol. Lorca had many other great concerts. Creamfields made its’ appearance and the Rolling Stones came to Almeria in grand style. Locally, venues like Aku Aku, Jazz Life, Palo Alto, Roly’s, Tito’s, The Irish Rover, Sax On The Beach, Galas, Rayo del Sol, El Castillo and many others had regular line-ups each week. Again, in this issue I’m going to depart from that to give you an update on the proposed International Jazz Festival.

A number of meetings took place in which the Mayor of Mojácar agreed that such an event would be very good for this area. Other city officials agreed. The purpose of these meetings was to outline and finalize an agreement which was to define the relationshp between the organizers and Mojácar. Originally, we had had hoped that the event could occur in September 2006. Although planning has been going on for many months and city officials were on board, final formal city approvals and authorizations were requested and not provided by the deadline necessary for production of the festival. A deadline of June 1 was set as the last possible date to announce the event, launch the media campaign and finalize all the agreements. That date has now come and gone. Three months is just not quite enough time to do it right. This event should not be rushed and should be presented in a professional manner.

Planning such an event can take up to a year to put everything into place including capturing the support of potential major sponsors. Garnering the support of potential major sponsors takes time and more importantly, if the production of this event is rushed and it fails to meet expectations, serious damage could result to the reputation of the city, the event’s reputation and the festival’s ability to successfully garner and maintain sponsorship and promote future events.

Although an extensive plan has been developed, much more work would need to be done even after formal city authorizations are in place in order to pull this event off by September of this year so, we are now looking at holding the event in September 2007. A scaled down version was discussed for possibly this year with the grand festival edition to be presented next year.

Obviously, even a scaled down version for this year is not possible. We had hoped to at least give residents and tourists an inside look of what’s possible and what to expect next year. Timing is everything and there was just no time left! We need corporate sponsorship to make this work in any shape or form. Our plan also includes presenting a series of bi-monthly concerts preceding the actual Jazz Festival each year. It is better to plan the event for next September 2007 and execute our plan to promote the bi-monthly concert series, perhaps starting this winter.

By the way, I believe I have previously stated how passionate I am about bringing quality live music entertainment to Mojácar and especially about promoting this jazz festival. As many of you might know, I own the restaurant and bar Sax On The Beach, and am also a musician. Just how passionate am I? I’m so passionate about this project that I have given serious thought and decided to sell the restaurant while I complete the festival planning, management and production, then reopen later in a new, larger facility where we can really provide more accommodating dining and room for bigger and better live music entertainment.

I have spent so much of my personal time and money working on organizing and planning this festival recently that sometimes to our detriment, I have often closed the restaurant to work on the festival planning, attend meetings or believe it or not, in the interest of helping promote quality live music, I have played at other venues such as Jazz Life Cafe and Palo Alto.

Now, what about those rumors of our recent closing? In June, we discovered that our locale’s electrical designation was never changed to commercial use causing us to temporarily close until the change had been completed, nothing more and nothing less. In one respect, closing was not good but on the other hand, I’ve had extra time to work with the Mayor, other city official’s and interested parties on making the festival a reality. Sax On The Beach is now open again providing great music and dining as before.

The development of this Jazz Festival can be very rewarding to the economic growth of the community. The festival will help boost local tourism and business and help reduce the reliance upon traditional ways of promoting the area. What do you think? Seriously, I want to hear from you. Write to me at saxjohnson2@gmail.com and if you’re interested in sponsoring or lending your expertise, call the festival office at 950-473-194.

Entertainment: On the local scene: An astounding round of applause goes out to all the new venues that are starting to provide live music entertainment regularly. Keep up the good work folks!