Despite the programme being launched back in December I haven't really written about the National Jazz Festival, which is a bit naughty.

It's almost becoming easy to take the festival for granted, what with it rolling around year after year, but one look at the line-up is to be reminded that this is not just the biggest event on Tauranga's musical calendar, but one ready to take its place alongside any national, or even international music festival.
And, having written about the jazz festival for well over a decade, I can't help but glance back and note the extraordinary success story that is the latest part of the event's nearly 50 year history.
It seems amazing, looking at the festival now, that by the early 90s it was in serious trouble and Waiheke Island was poised to become the centre of jazz at Easter. After years at the old town hall and subsequently at the racecourse, the festival had settled into a home at the Bureta Park Motor Inn and was a barely noticeable blip on even Tauranga's radar. Things had reached a point where there was serious consideration of stopping the festival altogether and simply continuing with the Youth Jazz Band Competition.
It was around then that the organisers of the Waiheke Island Festival of Jazz approached the Tauranga Jazz Society committee and offered to buy the name of the festival, the ‘National Jazz Festival'.
Given they had no money and an event that was in the doldrums, we can now only stand up and applaud the people who said ‘no'. I don't know who they were exactly but I expect a few of them are still out there playing. I think maybe trumpeter Brian Goegan was involved and a couple of other well-respected veteran musicians. They deserve eternal thanks for their foresight, or possibly simple stubbornness.
It could have gone either way. Waiheke Island could now be the site of the National Jazz Festival and Tauranga could be having a quiet Easter with half the town heading away to look for fun elsewhere. Instead Tauranga rejigged its model and, despite much scepticism at the time, moved the afternoon festival downtown into the bars and restaurants and shifted the concert series to Baycourt.
It was a brave move, particularly given that the Jazz Society was substantially in the red at the time – any money spent had to be raised from what grants were available and local sponsors, most of whom had forgotten about the festival's existence. Damian Forlong, up from Wellington this year with his band Shaken Not Stirred, was a big part of that effort, as was Jennifer Murray.
I talked to Damian recently and he told me for that first year of the downtown model (1994 or 1995 he thought) the bars were charged the princely sum of $250 a day and most turned it down because they said no one would go to a jazz festival on The Strand.
How times change. Now Waiheke is gone and the National Jazz Festival in Tauranga is New Zealand's biggest jazz event and the single largest annual gathering of musicians in the country.
Forgive me if I've been repeating myself in running through this history one more time, but I think it merits a recap, because it really
is extraordinary. The dilemma –
I suspect – for the planners and organisers is what to do next because the festival, for all its size and scope, is once more at something of
a crossroads.
This year's programme again includes two (very impressive) overseas artists in the form of Trombone Shorty and Mary Coughlan. To really put the festival on the national and international map this is the area that should grow. Two is phenomenal – half a dozen…?
But, by the same token, this is the New Zealand National Jazz Festival, not an International Jazz Festival and the implication of the name is that it is ultimately and primarily a showcase of the best of New Zealand jazz. It's a fine line, and a philosophical discussion that I'm sure is taking place continually.
For now, let's just be glad we have such a special event here. In the next few weeks I'll look at the (magnificent) programme in more depth. In the meantime you can get info at www.jazz.org.nz.