Special concert series for Rye

The Rye International Jazz & Blues Festival has organised a stunning series of December concerts at the beautiful setting of St Mary's Church in Rye.
Rye Jazz Festival's Christmas programme includes Claire Martin SUS-160911-100400001Rye Jazz Festival's Christmas programme includes Claire Martin SUS-160911-100400001
Rye Jazz Festival's Christmas programme includes Claire Martin SUS-160911-100400001

Three confirmed events will combine the best in inspirational musicianship and vocal talent.

Thursday December 8 sees the festival present rock keyboard maestro, and member of Yes, Rick Wakeman who comes to Rye following his sell-out American tour. Rick will be performing an intimate programme for this unique performance on acoustic piano. His solo career is both impressive and expansive producing over 100 solo albums and selling more than 50 million copies across the world.

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Rick is famous for his one man shows and you can expect amazing music, laughter and stories from his 50 years in the music business.

The following evening (Friday December 9) is a perfect time to get into Christmas with an uplifting concert from multi-award winning London Community Choir and special guest Mica Paris.

Those who attended Mica’s sell out concert at the festival in August will remember a wonderful performance and now she returns to dazzle once more. Mica’s music inspiration is rooted in gospel and soul music so her talent blended with that of the choir will take the audience to a whole new level.

Ian Shaw and Clair Martin will dazzle together on Wednesday December 14 in a jazz special.

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These two award-winning jazz vocalists are also celebrated radio broadcasters and their easy anecdotal stagecraft is as finely skilled as their music-making. Ian and Clair’s Xmas cracker is an evening packed with winter warmers and classic songs from both the Jazz and pop canon.

Expect 1930s New York, 1940s Christmas cinema evergreens, the gloss of Fifties Hollywood (Nat Cole, Doris Day, Eartha Kitt), the celebrated 1960s Brill Building (Carole King, James Taylor) to the darker spirits of the more contemporary writers (The Pogues, Nick Cave, Joni Mitchell).

Ian and Claire perform at many famous jazz festivals and clubs and are both outstanding live performers. For more information and to purchase tickets, please go to www.ryejazz.com.

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