Seychelles holding festival for blues and jazz lovers this weekend

The Seychelles’ Jazz and Blues Festival will showcase local groups such as Metis, Collective Soul and Chapter 3 as well as groups from the region (Joe Laurence, Seychelles News Agency)

(Seychelles News Agency) - What a beautiful world is going to be this weekend when the sounds of jazz and blues fill the Seychelles’ capital Victoria in the island nation’s first-ever festival.

Jazz and blues lovers are expected to be enthralled during a festival that will take place at the Plas Kreativ at the car park of the International Conference Centre of Seychelles (ICCS) on Saturday from 7 p.m in Victoria.

Galen Bresson, the chief executive of the Creative Industries and National Events Agency (CINEA), said: “After years that the jazz festival was missing on annual programmes, we found it necessary to put such event early on CINEA’s calendar of activities.”

The Jazz and Blues festival will be held on Saturday 6. (CINEA) Photo License: CC-BY

The Seychelles’ Jazz and Blues Festival will showcase local groups such as Metis, Collective Soul and Chapter 3 as well as groups from the region -- African Jazz Hounds from South Africa. Three groups from neighbouring Indian Ocean islands will also be performing -- Damien Elisa Quartet from Mauritius, Mi-Mo from Madagascar and Mascareignes from Reunion -- a French department in the region.

Why a fusion of jazz and blues?

“Because they are genres of music which are very similar to each other, many groups who play jazz -- play blues, soul and similar genres of music as well,” said Bresson.

The chief executive added that: “We also wanted to try and show diversity in the Seychelles in terms of the groups playing and performing and also show diversity to the up and coming musicians so that these types of music are explored professionally.”

“We want to encourage different genre of music, we want to show the professional levels of music that exist and also show that there is life to all genres of music and not specifically certain mainstream types which is rather more popular here in Seychelles.

The chief executive of CINEA feels that after years that the jazz festival was missing on annual programmes, CINEA found it necessary to put the event early on their calendar of activities.” (Joe Laurence, Seychelles News Agency) Photo License: CC-BY

The jazz and blues are musical genres regarded as two distinct American musical traditions. Music experts believe that the main differences between the two is that there are more rhythmic deviations in jazz music as opposed to blues and that jazz is principally more instrumental compared to blues which is more vocal.

Bresson says that the jazz and blues festival will become an annual event on CINEA’s calendar of activities, and is expected to be held during the last weekend of April. As much as possible each year regional and international groups will be invited to participate.