The Guelph Jazz Festival, in partnership with the Improvisation, Community, and Social Practice project, has received a $134,800 grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation (OTF). The three-year OTF grant will provide funds to support community outreach activities (such as the Improviser in Residence program), enhance Nuit Blanche programming, and strengthen the Guelph Jazz Festival's overall capacity by hiring staff.

“A commitment to diversity, collaboration, and rootedness in the community have long been hallmarks of the Guelph Jazz Festival, and with the generous support of this recent Ontario Trillium Foundation grant, we're excited to have the opportunity to enlarge on these commitments as well as on the success of our existing outreach initiatives,” said Ajay Heble, Artistic Director of the Guelph Jazz Festival and Project Director for ICASP. “Through partnerships with a range of community-based organizations, we will use the funds we've received from OTF to develop innovative strategies to put improvising musicians in direct, meaningful, and sustained contact with the broader communities in which they live and work.”

The 2011 Improviser in Residence is juno-award winning saxophonist/flutist Jane Bunnett.

Read the full press release here.

"Guelph Jazz festival gets $134,800 grant" Guelph Mercury 27 November 2010