Stanley Clarke and Angelique Kidjo among performers at 5th annual community event.
By Jimmy Dominguez, Managing Editor & Jeremiah Rojas, Staff Reporter
Dignity Health Sports Park was the site of the fifth annual Dymally International Jazz and Arts Festival on Apr. 27. The groovy sounds of iconic musicians like Stanley Clarke and Angelique Kidjo filled the campus air to the delight of attendees young and old. The festival also featured a visual artists’ pavilion, a bazaar of local vendors, and a smorgasbord of tasty treats and foods for jazz fans to enjoy.
As the acclaimed, Grammy award-winning soul musician Judith Hill held court on the main stage, festival attendees soaked up the sun beaming down into the park. One of them, Ebone Robey, came out to Dignity Health Sports Park this year to support small businesses while listening to live music, particularly Jonathan Butler. The DNA of music and rhythm, according to Robey, is jazz.
“I think about instruments working together to compose beautiful masterpieces,” Robey said. “Being in a space where artists are creating, that is really wonderful. I’m a young adult – a young millennial – so coming here and just seeing all these generations come together on top of that is really cool.”
CSUDH President Thomas A. Parham told The Bulletin the jazz festival exemplified the idea that the campus is an integral part of the greater Carson community.
“To invite the community into our space is just wonderful – I’m loving it,” Parham said.
The president also loved seeing Dominguez Hills’ own Teodross Avery kick off the festival with a soulful saxophone performance on the main stage. Avery has been a professor of jazz studies and commercial music at CSUDH since 2017.
Mira Gandy and Wendell Wiggins were two of the local artists whose work was featured at this year’s festival. The event was a change of pace for Gandy, whose art is usually showcased at galleries. She said the jazz festival offered an opportunity to connect music and visual art.
“I love music, and I think there’s a real connection between music and art,” Gandy said. “As an artist – a visual artist – you’re always playing music, so I thought that [attending] would be great.”
Gandy’s artwork explores the ways in which women move through society. She described her work as colorful and expressive, and said she was inspired by the atmosphere of the festival.
Wiggins was also a first-time attendee at the Dymally festival, though he’s been a jazz fan all his life. To be sharing a space with such esteemed musicians like Clarke, Kidjo, and Third World was “perfect” for the type of work he does, Wiggins said.
“I grew up with it before I was old enough to buy a record of my own,” Wiggins said. “My father had all the great jazz albums. I didn’t even know it at the time … all the albums that everybody thinks are the classic jazz hits and the most iconic ones were the ones that I still have in his collection at home.”
Meanwhile, on the second stage, jazz singer Aretha Scruggs performed for the crowd. Scruggs loved the constant flow of music throughout the venue. She said the festival introduced jazz fans to new artists.
“To have festivals like this, we get the opportunity to not only perform as performers, but people get to hear sounds and colors that they’ve never imagined from different artists from all over the world,” Scruggs said.