Connecticut’s Largest World Music Concert Series Grows Even Larger

BRIDGEPORT — Africa, Puerto Rico, Mexico, the Caribbean and eastern Europe represent just a smattering of the countries represented on the expanded Summer Sounds of the World (SSOW) concert series that will take place in July and August. The 11 Summer Sounds of the World concerts have grown to be the largest free world music series in Connecticut and one of the largest in New England.

In addition to blues, salsa, steel-drum, American folk and Yiddish wedding music there will be traditional and avant-garde jazz. There will also be a day featuring some of Connecticut’s most talented young people performing hip-hop music, break dancing and slam poetry.

Summer Sounds of the World will present concerts at Chase Plaza/City Hall Annex in downtown, Bridgeport Ferry Terminal, and historic Washington Park.

The series will kick off on July 5 with an introduction by Mayor Joseph Ganim of jazz artist Sherry Winston and her band. She is currently one of the most popular flutists in jazz with appearances at major international jazz festivals throughout the world.

Her concert will be at Chase Plaza/City Hall Annex and will begin at noon.

The Washington Park concerts kick off on Sunday, July 29, with the blues master James Cotton, about whom the New York Daily News wrote, “We’re talking about the blues, loud and fast and getting down and dirty, we’re talking about James Cotton, a singer, stomper, and harp-player extraordinaire.” Cotton won a Grammy Award for his recent Verve album Deep in the Blues, appeared on the David Letterman and Conan O’Brien shows, and performed harmonica for many years with the legendary Muddy Waters.

James Cotton Blues Band will begin its concert at 3 pm. Washington Park, the concert location, is on the corner of Barnum and Noble Avenues.

In addition to Ms Winston and Mr Cotton’s shows, the 2001 SSOW calendar includes a concert by Galvanized Jazz Band on July 5 at 5 pm at Bridgeport Ferry Terminal, on Water Street; Urban Youth Xplosion on Thursday, July 19, at noon, at Chase Plaza/City Hall Annex; and Washboard Slim & The Blue Lights, July 19, 5 pm, at Bridgeport Ferry Terminal.

The schedule continues with Mexican mariachi music by the band Fiesta on Thursday, August 2, at noon, at Chase Plaza; Paradigm Shift, a combination of traditional New Orleans brass band with new music sensibility, on August 2, at 5 pm, at Bridgeport Ferry Terminal; and the vocal ensemble Anonymous 4 on Thursday, August 16, at noon, at Chase Plaza.

Traditional eastern European music with Klez Generation continues the series on August 16, at 5 pm, at Bridgeport Ferry Terminal; one of New England’s premier plena bands – with bomba, salsa, calypso and jazz influences – Los Pleneros Del Coco, will perform Sunday, August 26, at 3 pm, at Washington Park; and the finalé will be with the Caribbean group The Sunrise Steel Band, on Thursday, August 30, at 5 pm, at Bridgeport Ferry Terminal.

For additional information, call 203-367-7917 or send email to KPAI@aol.com.