Absolutely looking forward to the San Jose Jazz High School All Stars' performance this Sunday at the Next Generation Jazz Festival (NGJF) in Monterey. This is a huge honor and will be a memorable experience for the students. What is the NGJF, you may be asking yourself? It's a competitive jazz festival that was started years ago as one of the programs on the educational side of the Monterey Jazz Festival. NGJF is now considered to be one of the premier competitive jazz festivals on the west coast, if not the country. Although primarily centered around the single high school competition held on Saturday of the festival, there is also a conglomerate high school division held on Sunday, which is what the HSAS will be competing in. There are six bands in the conglomerate division competing. The honor of being able to compete in the festival comes from the screening process. Many, many bands from across the country submit unedited audition recordings which are screened and refereed by members of the faculty of the Berkelee College of Music. They choose the top six recordings from all that they received and invite those groups to participate. By being selected to come out to the festival, a group can safely consider themselves within the top one percent of bands in the country in their category - even before the competition happens! It is indeed exciting. I am also personally looking forward to being on "this side" of NGJF; I have been an adjudicator for this festival many times in the past and can attest to its excellence. Congratulations to the 2016 Finalists! * * * Click to watch live NGJF web stream   Sunday, April 10 Monterey Conference Center Pavilion Conglomerate Big Bands 9am  Tucson Jazz Institute "Basie" Big Band 9:30am  Colburn Jazz Workshop Big Band 10am  San Jose Jazz High School All Stars  10:30am  Jazzschool Studio Band 11am  American Music Program Pacific Crest Jazz Orchestra 11:30am  Tucson Jazz Institute "Ellington" Big Band Museum of Monterey Spotlight Performances 1:30pm  San Jose Jazz High School All Stars #SJZ  #NextJazz16  #MontereyJazz