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Join us for an afternoon of relaxing, picnicking, and dancing at historic Orchard Park, near downtown Durham. Your hosts, the Mint Julep Jazz Band will perform 3 sets of music from and inspired by the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. 

This event is free and open to the public. Donations to the band are encouraged.

Orchard Park is located at 1000 S. Duke Street, Durham, NC 27707, with the picnic near the intersection of Duke and Cobb Streets.

Parking is along the streets bordering the park and in the adjoining neighborhood.

This project was supported by the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources, with funding from the National Endowment for the Arts and Durham Arts Council local grants administrator.

For updates, check the event’s Facebook page.

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It’s been a wild ride with Kickstarter and getting things ready for the album – we are so excited to be in the recording studio this weekend and have so many people to thank for this. Specifically, our incredible backers who have funded this endeavor with their pre-orders and merchandise purchases vis-a-vis a Kickstarter campaign! We were able to raise a total of $14,025, which exceeded our goal and will help us not only with anticipated expenses, but also with those pesky unanticipated ones.

We love you madly! Thanks so much to our backers, in chronological order:

Adrian Fahrer
The Creative Fund by BackerKit
Jennifer Barnett
Clara M
Michael Steinman
Melissa Hinkel
Karin Abell
Lauren Gibson
Oren Forward
Ryan Swift
윤제현
Michael Quisao
Jongha Kang
Allison Wilhelm
Sharon Ermolowich
Andy Nishida
Sebree Turner
Kenneth F. Hanson
Dorobo
Laura Boyes
joe oneil
Christina Evans
Bobby Cook
Emily A Anderson
Wes Price
Paul Riding
Bryan Fagan
Jack Mitchell
Miranda Lank
Elizabeth Watkins
Nathaniel Lynch
Sarah Henderson
Kit Ness
K&T Eisenbeis
Mel Khaw
Aidan Dunne
Edward Shaddow
Rory Gill
Paul Gilbert
ryan lemar
Joseph Bopp
Sarah Price
Robert Bradford
Susan Carson
Karmi Fossen
Paul J. McLaurin
Steven Travis
Eris
Jenna Schenker
Tiffany K
Steven Morgan
Kathleen
Summerlin Page
Katie Del Vecchio
Amanda Gerken
Heather Adams
Moriah Wood
Celina
Jesse Gearhart
Deborah Farthing
Jean-Michel Oblette
Kristin Buxton
Rachel Hundley
Billie Feather
Tom Lassiter
John Derrick
Larry Falck
Michael Brown
Clare Diaz
Lian Tarhay
Stephanie Stratton
Michelle Lee
Jason Sager
Allison Meeks
Will Brown
Jesse Miner
Arcelia Long
Robert Szarka
JonathanLaFarge
Katie Moore
Amanda Fletcher
Gary Chyi
Christina
David Soltysik
Julia Eager
Karen Shaffer
Marc Latou
Matthew Brooks
Steve Pruskin
Mike Guzzo
David Goodwin
Brennan Ames-Phares
Rocio Leon
Jason Knight
Hilary Buuck
Sid Sondergard
Andréas Olsson
Jo Hannes
Andreas Kaltenegger
Tina Spencer
Timothy Korkuc
Deniz Adalar
John Rowe
Bret
Anna Anderson
Alina Kerov
Hussain Jaffery
Maya Bernstein
Summer Evans
Bob Proctor
Chris Ronderos
D B Mathews
Valerie Davis
Alex
revclemens
Matt Lam
Shiri Gutman
Zachary Malone
David Giovinazzo
Viji Sathy
Beth Ringwald Carnes
Margot Helm
Olivia
Sarah White
Renée Paulette McGee
Tina Jordan
Lynn Redmile
Micah
Stephanie Nicole
Raewyn McCombs
Ann
Nicole Sinwell
Jennifer Reed
Daniel Winkelman
Doug Noel
Laurie Desch
Sarah Blumenthal
Larisa Harrison
stany
Brian Sheridan
Taylor Stender
David Barry
Amiya Gupta
Roger Sinasohn
David
Tatsuo Endo
Mary Kyle Manson
Brian Green
Stephen
Kelly Tomlinson
Alex Nah
Tiffany Christensen
Benjamin Cass
Patrick Flowers
William
mary lou mazzara
Albert Alva
Sarah Jensen
Candi Terry
Sara K
Kade Major
cam connor
Lauren Smith
Caroline Que
Keli Hawthorne
Samuel Sykes
Brandi
Heidi
Michelle Long
Gary Holland
Peter Shilliday
Steve Wilcox
Douglas Bae
E Simmons
Julie Estelle Rudd
Jennifer Tolliver
Gena Bell Vargas
Warren Cheung
Don Von hagen
Lauren
Elise Margaret Roth
Lily Shaw
Rich Lyons
Leta Coop
해품달
John Mortenson
Bennie
Antonia Burns
Nicholas Centino
Mimi Liu
Jonathan Buck
Russell Sagraves
Tiffany Brantner
Robert Powell
Jim Wheatley
Gretchen Midgley
TG
Todd Gage
Jimmy Cobb
Rose Jones
Tamlin Pavelsky
Woody McKenzie
Constance Poore
Jason Lempka
Richard Poole
Thomas Bantle
Alan Roberson
Natalie Gabriel
SP Samedi
Madeleine Brook
Rob Moreland
Adam Hitchcock
Srishti Bhagat
Scott M. Manson
Richard Jeffrey Diaz
Lisa Macharoni
Gabrielle Kern
Hillary Hudson
Christopher Pierick
George Patterson
The Warmans
Jessica King
Dani McQueen
Brad Nathanson
Moya

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The South Carolina Jazz Festival has reimagined itself for COVID and the Mint Julep Jazz Band will be performing an outdoor concert as part of the festival!  Here are the details:

October 15, 2021 
7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. 
The Wine Factory 
165 2nd Street
Cheraw, SC

Held in Dizzy Gillespie’s hometown, we are delighted to be a part of this event, after having scheduling conflicts for several years.  Thanks so much to the festival for asking again this year!

If you’ve never been to Cheraw, it’s a little over two hours from Durham, NC and here are some other location driving times:
– Greensboro, NC – 1.5 hours
– Charlotte, NC – 1.5 hours
– Columbia, SC – 1.75 hours
– Charleston, SC – 2.3 hours
– Wilmington, NC – 2.3 hours

Whether you’re in for the weekend, taking a day trip, or just riding in for the show and getting back late because the next day is Saturday and you can sleep in, we promise lots of great swing music.  BONUS: you can stick around until 11 p.m. and catch more swing with the last set of Le Pumpe‘s jazz manouche!  They are playing from 8-11 at the Bistro Restaurant, just around the corner from The Wine Factory.

Click here for the full lineup and list of venues/addresses.

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Fellow swing bandleader Glenn Crytzer has put out the call to action for musicians to donate this week’s Bandcamp proceeds to an organization that will help uplift the black community – the Mint Julep Jazz Band is joining in. We will donate all proceeds of this week’s Bandcamp sales to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which is an organization that litigates against white supremacist groups, classifies and monitors hate groups, and promotes tolerance education programs. If you have not already purchased both of our albums, now is a great time – we’ll be donating all proceeds from June 1-7, 2020. 
 
Please also see the call on Glenn’s Facebook post if you are a musician and to see the bands joining in – maybe you own both of our albums, but there’s other great jazz music in the list that will also benefit the black community.

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-1The Duck Jazz Festival is a special and unique event in North Carolina and we were excited to perform as part of the festival in 2015 – coastal North Carolina is not known for its bustling music scene (Laura writing here, as a native of Beaufort, can attest to this firsthand), so that the coastal town of Duck, along with sponsors such as the North Carolina Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts, puts their efforts into a well-curated, day-long jazz festival that is free and open to the public on a beautiful beach-side town commons is a feat, a wonder, and a blissful experience for those coastal natives who may not make it to larger metro areas very often to catch the latest in jazz performances.

This year the festival has expanded to include two days of music – the traditional day-long festival on Sunday and they have added a Saturday afternoon set on the town commons featuring the Mint Julep Jazz Band.  We hope you will join us for this free show from 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. with a swing dance lesson between sets taught by Laura and Keenan.   Then, stay for Sunday’s concerts, with performances from Davina and the Vagabonds, the Marquis Hill Blacktet, the Rad Trads, the Robert Jospe Express Trio, the Second Marine Aircraft Wing Jazz Ensemble, and the First Flight High School Jazz Band.

To be asked back to perform at this festival is an honor and a joy – the jazz fans at this festival are gracious and responsive, the best audience an artist could ask for.  See you soon, Duck!

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Excited to be returning to Richmond, VA this weekend for I Heart Bal, a wonderful Balboa workshop weekend with this year’s slogan of “Don’t Stop BALievin'” and world-class Balboa instruction from Kelly Arsenault and Mickey Fortanasce, Chelsea Lee and David Lee, and Annabel Quisao and Michael Quisao.  If you love swing music, unicorns, and awesome people, this is probably the event for you. See you soon, lovelies!

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a2618128978_16Swing bandleader Glenn Crytzer wanted to do something to make a difference, so he had this idea of a compilation album of modern day swing and traditional jazz bands coming together to contribute music to benefit the American Civil Liberties Union.  After reaching out to 16 bands (including the Mint Julep Jazz Band!), fundraising, organizing the production of this album, and getting the blessing of the ACLU, the album is ready for purchase!  Pick up a copy of That New Old Sound on Bandcamp, either digital or physical, and if you order by December 17, he’ll ship it to you in time for Christmas – an extra $2.00 and he’ll even gift wrap it for you.  All the proceeds from the sale of this album go to the ACLU to support the defense and preservation of civil liberties

Who’s on this album?  Lots of swing and early jazz goodness from all over the United States, including, of course, Glenn Crytzer (New York), Tuba Skinny (New Orleans), Greg Ruby and the Rhythm Runners (Seattle), Dandy Wellington and his Band (New York), the Boilermaker Jazz Band (Pittsburgh), Jonathan Stout and his Campus Five (Los Angeles), Dan Levinson and his Canary Cottage Dance Orchestra (New York), Gordon Webster (New York), Mint Julep Jazz Band (Durham, NC), Mona’s Hot Four (New York), Solomon Douglas (Seattle/New York/a boat somewhere off the coast of Australia), the Grand Street Stompers (New York), Jonathan Doyle Swingtet (Austin/Chicago), Meschiya Lake and the Little Big Horns (New Orleans), George Gee Swing Orchestra (New York), and Baby Soda (New York).

We are excited to be a part of this compilation album, a great gift idea for any jazz lover or to give someone as a sampler of what’s going on with early jazz today, and to do a small part to contribute to the greater good.

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It’s time to do what we were born to do – play for our home crowd of swing dancers at the Triangle Swing Dance Society dance on the Triangle’s best social dance floor, the ballroom at the Carrboro Century Center on March 19, 2016.  If you don’t know how to dance, TSDS has you covered with a free beginner lesson at 7:00 p.m. before the dance.  Come swing with us!

Carrboro Century Center
100 N. Greensboro St.
Carrboro, NC
Time: Band plays from 8:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m.
Admission: Members/Students $8, Non-members $12

MJJB at PSDS St. Patrick
Photo from Mint Julep Jazz Band’s performance at the Carrboro Century Center on St. Patrick’s Day 2013, courtesy of Joel Carlin.

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Dearest backers and contributors,

Thank you so much for your love and support, in all the ways, of the Mint Julep Jazz Band’s new album endeavor, Battle Axe! We’ll be heading into the studio in April to record the album and in the interim I’ll be getting information from you in the coming weeks and connecting some of you with contributor vendors so that we can fulfill your rewards, which are so deservedly earned for your faith and pledges in our album project. I’ll also be posting our list of Kickstarter backers and contributors on the website for a more proper thank you. Stay tuned!

Infinite thanks!

Mint Julep Jazz Band