Over 10,500 viewings of Collage Jazz EFG Festival Gigs

Karamel is a venue that is much beloved by the Jazz Community. We have a long tradition of supporting artists and developing audiences for a very diverse range of jazz. It was going to take more than a lockdown to stop us from promoting a programme for the EFG London Jazz Festival.

Preeti Dasgupta who programmed the festival for Collage Arts said: “It was very humbling. The artists were saying to me – this is the first gig we have done since March and we recorded the gigs in November.  Collage Arts, who programme Karamel, are luckier than most venues in that we are at the heart of the Wood Green Cultural Quarter. So, we could call on camera crews, directors and a sound recording team. This means the production qualities of our 11 gigs are really high. The audiences really appreciated the effort we had all put in.”

Since the recordings went live, the 11 gigs have attracted over 10,500 screenings.

Zantogola’s west African jazz vibe opened the festival and proved a big hit with over 2,000 viewings.  Henry Lowther’s Still Waters, Anoushka Lucas and the Cosimo Keita Trio all achieved over 1,000 screenings.

Preeti adds: “We are sharing 11 hours of superb footage from the gigs. Our definition of jazz is deliberately inclusive. We featured work from different cultural traditions, and we had an emphasis on promoting some younger artists and showcasing women. I have to highlight the Tomorrow’s Warriors gig where Mia Runham & Amy Gadiaga premiered work commissioned by Collage Arts as part of a body of work that supported women of colour to record their feelings about lockdown. What is nice about streaming the work is that we are getting thank you from Jazz fans all around the world – I hope we can welcome them all to Karamel when gigs return in Spring 2021.”

The gigs will remain on-line until February 2021 and then at the discretion of the artists.

Collage Arts does not receive funding for its jazz programme, it has been financed by the generosity of the jazz fans attending our gigs.

If you wish to support this work, head to www.collage-arts.org/gift-aid