by Max Marbut
Staff Writer
One thing that might be running through peoples’ minds this weekend at the Jacksonville Jazz Festival is the question, “How did all this get started anyway?”
To answer that question the City’s Office of Special Events invited one of the festival’s founders, Mike Tolbert, to a “Jazz Talk” yesterday at Snyder Memorial Church on Laura Street, one of this year’s festival venues.
In addition to being regarded as “The Godfather” of the festival, Tolbert was instrumental in the negotiations that led to the Jacksonville Jazz Festival’s national and international exposure on PBS and introduced the Great American Piano Competition as a festival warm-up event. He was also inducted into the festival’s Hall of Fame.
In 1981, Tolbert worked for the City as an aide to Mayor Jake Godbold when the need for a signature event for Jacksonville became evident.
“I was at the right place at the right time with the right mayor,” said Tolbert. “Jake Godbold knew people and he knew we had to change the attitude the people had about their city — Jacksonville had an inferiority complex back then. Godbold knew if the people could feel better about Jacksonville the city could do great things.”
After Godbold visited Baltimore and saw what that city was doing to revitalize its waterfront with special events, Tolbert was assigned to determine whether that concept could also work here and Godbold pointed him in the direction of Mayport.
“I spent a lot of time down there,” said Tolbert. “I watched the people and I watched the shrimp boats and I watched the ferry. I took a tape player with me and listened to all kinds of music — rock, country, blues — of all the music I listened to jazz just seemed to work with the rhythm of Mayport.”
When “Mayport and All That Jazz” debuted as a one-day free concert, Tolbert said organizers were less than prepared for what was going to happen.
“We were shocked when more than 70,000 people showed up. The police told us we had a problem — traffic was backed up on Atlantic Boulevard all the way to University (Boulevard). We believed we had caught magic in a bottle,” said Tolbert.
The festival is moving to a new venue this year. After many years at Metropolitan Park near the Sports Complex, the music and all that goes along with it will take over the heart of Downtown along Laura Street from Hemming Plaza to the Landing.
Tolbert said moving the festival has historically meant growth and recalled why the event moved to Jacksonville in 1982 and the effect of the change of venue.
“It got too large for Mayport,” he explained. “Back then Metropolitan Park was a big, flat piece of mud used for football game parking, but it was on the river and it worked. If you create an energy people will come and enjoy it and be introduced to something new.”
Tolbert said he thinks moving the event into Downtown can capture the atmosphere of a riverfront festival while adding an element that wasn’t part of the scene at Metropolitan Park.
“I believe in the river and I believe in Downtown and you’ve got to experiment,” he said.
With precipitation falling on the roof of Snyder Memorial as Tolbert shared Jazz Festival memories, the question had to come up: did it ever rain in those early days?
“Oh yes,” said Tolbert. “The second year we had Buddy Rich and his Big Band and Della Reese who played the first festival and then came back the next year. It rained torrents and we had to call off the show but the people wouldn’t leave.”
He also said much of the credit for the long-term success of the Jacksonville Jazz Festival has to go to the thousands of volunteers who have contributed over the years.
“We took our lead from the TPC and its volunteers,” said Tolbert. “When the golfers arrived, they were treated like royalty and we did the same thing with the musicians. We soon found out they weren’t treated as well in other places where they performed, so they became ambassadors for Jacksonville in the music community. They told everybody that if they got a chance to play in Jacksonville, do it.
“I get a lot of credit for the Jacksonville Jazz festival, but what has really made it successful is the people. It’s the investment of human capital that makes things work.”
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