The third and final day started with: La Bomba de Tiempo

14-piece percussion troupe made their way from Argentina to get us on our feet dancing and shaking to their hippy/ Latin vibe with their hand clapping and banging their drums and percussions all this was conducted live by senior members taking turns.

You have no choice. You will dance! There’s this energy in the crowd that’s uncontrollable and addictive; the energy starts a bit more slow paced at first. Playing the crowd is their specialty. They love to interact with the crowd. It was a dance fest over there, everyone dancing and swaying to the beats, shaking their hips and spinning their dates around. The unisons of the group was mind boggling especially with so many members, and I think they were enjoying it as much as we did, the looks on their faces and the way they danced while playing gave made that abundantly clear.

Carlos Santana

Santana took us on a trip to Lala Land with his dream, Latin, rock music. I can honestly say that I experienced being in Woodstock when I heard him as he played ‘Black Magic Woman’.

Santana then implores us with his arms wide open asking them to, “Keep politics and religion on the side and to practice living in harmony and to unit all of us loving each other and also channeling our energy positively”.

The bassist gave us a strong solo followed by drum solo before giving Santanaspace to play ‘Maria Maria’ and got the crowd dancing and grooving on every strum he played and ending his set-list with ‘Smooth’. What a hipster, I think Santana gave us an experience to remember and words of wisdom to live by.

To sum up, all three days of the event were for both the artist and the fans. With all the organization and the different stands at the back where you can stand and still see the entire show happening and the proper space for the fans. I think the crowd did a great job interacting with the artist and the vibe was amazing, I really believe these three days left a huge mark in everyone’s heart and definitely left them with great memories for both the artist who are going to cherish the crowds reaction and for the crowd who left with a smile on their faces because they saw how dedicated the artist were.Kudos for the organizers and Emirates Airlines who did a great job on bringing those artists to Dubai.

Written by: Rim ElJurdi
Photography by: Hasan Kaissi
Edited by: NJ Bakr

– Have you missed our reviews for previous days at the festival? Here is Day One and Day Two.

– For our photography coverage you can find on our Facebook page through here.

You probably never felt classy if you haven’t attended David Grey’s performance, this talented indie rock artist – which is in my opinion a lost art nowadays – gave us a true meaning to music with his Guitar and Piano skills.

It’s been 5 years since David had performed in Dubai, and as he strolled to the microphone, surrounded by a six-piece band, which fleshed out the songs with keyboards, cello, double bass and harmonies, they gave us a beautiful spiritual experience.

The captivating, melancholy Night blindness has Gray asking “What we gonna do/When the money runs out?” while by far the track most reminiscent of his older work with its droning strum, is an ice-cold anthem to frustration. It was perhaps that these songs came from Gray’s heart in a direct way.Gray is someone you look at on stage and say to yourself, “This man understands how it feels to be trapped in a tough world”, and this gives each of the songs a disarming authenticity. While he slipped back into a more straightforward musical mode for a few tracks, like ‘Sail Away’ and ‘Lullaby’.

While Chris Botti was setting up I took a quick look around and went to Adidas to check out their roof top bar and it was amazing, they had a huge blue screen that had an equalizer that was working along with music it caught from the stage and that is creative and catchy. Well done, Adidas! Their roof top also had a good view to the stage which gave their guest a chance to have the best of both world, and the best part of this whole thing was that it was free for whomever wants to go there 😀

Chris Botti

The only actual JAZZ played in the entire festival; Bottiand his band were sensational to say the least. I don’t think I will ever experience a Thursday night like this again. It’s not very common to find a trumpet player as a front man, let alone have a group carry his name. Botti is simply like no other, when he took the stage the crowd roared to the point where I had trouble hearing what he was saying. After his opening piece he invited the mesmerizing Caroline Campbell on violin. She is the embodiment of excellence, beautiful and talented and my favorite thing about her was how she swayed with the music, she wasn’t playing a musical piece, she was acting it. With every fiber in her being; her face, body, movements were all as expressive as the notes coming out of her violin, which made her performance all the more memorable. After she got off stage, Botti gave the crowd a treat that blew our minds. I never expected to hear‘Hallelujah’ played in a spiritual and melodic way; he definitely gave this song another meaning – we have a video, watch it here.

This show was full of surprises, as Botti invited Caroline back to the stage to play a solo because he said “It would not be fair to you all to have her here and not have her perform a solo piece for you.” She started playing this really deep and beautiful piece that had us all close our eyes and get in touch with feelings buried deep within our souls, that was until our eyes popped open wide, a cartoon character’s eyes would 😀 I felt like I was deep within the earth and then got catapulted to space in 1 quick second when that melancholic solo SUDDENLY transformed into something very familiar to ‘Kashmir’ by Led zeppelin. Needless to say the crowd went WILD singing along with the melodies and raising their rock on signs to the sky. Unforgettable…

Chris Botti is not done yet, not by a longshot. He brings on the man we’ve all been waiting for, the one and only Sting. I swear this guy has Benjamin Button disease; he just keeps on getting younger by time. Sting and Chris Botti paid homage to the late great Frank Sinatra by playing a rendition of ‘In the wee Small Hours of the Morning’ and what a rendition it was! It felt very personal since Sting and Botti met for the first time to play a Sinatra tribute concert. Sting gave us a taste of his greatest hits or it’s safe to say songs that we grew on listening to and falling in love with like ‘Fields of Gold’, ‘Shape of my Heart’, ‘Every Little Thing she does is Magic’, ‘7 days’, and of course ‘Englishman in New York’– watch a video here -which resulted in an EPIC crowd chant.

Sting then goes on to play a prolonged version of ‘Roxanne’ that just felt like it went on forever, during an interlude in the middle of the song where the crowd were singing along, the music suddenly stops and he utters those 6 magical words that sent chills through the spines of everyone there ‘Ain’t no Sunshine when she’s Gone’ OH YES HE DID!:D but only to go back to the chorus of ‘Roxanne’ in the end but with double time. It was a Mashup for the ages. Sting then performs ‘Desert Rose’ with the help of Caroline Campbell which a truly pleasant surprise, but not as good as watching him belly dance and shout at the crowd YALLA YALLA YALLA as he does.

Then the amazing Lee Pearson– drummer -plays a ridiculous 7 minute drum solo, it was one of those thing where someone had to collect your jaw from CHINA cause it hit the ground so hard. He used his hands, every type of drumstick known to man, in all sorts of positing including behind his back, he used his elbows,he clapped, used percussion, all in a flow without stopping the beat, I’ve seen a lot of drum solos in my day, nothing quite like this before. Sting performs what we thought was the last song ‘Every breath you take’ but then he comes back after the crowd pretty much DEMANDS IT to play a beautiful, soul healing Encore and he chose to end this unforgettable night with ‘Fragile’.

Written by: Rim ElJurdi and Ahmed S. Khalil
Photography by: Hasan Kaissi
Edited by: NJ Bakr

– Have you missed other festival days coverage? Here is Day One and Day Three.

– For our photography coverage you can find on our Facebook page through here.

On the 24th of Feb the phenomenal band Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox wowed us on stage with their amazing performance covering great pop songs in 20’s style jazz, swing, and other popular styles from that time. With songs like ‘Bye Bye Bye’ and ‘Only one’ they introduced the crowd to Aubrey Logan, who made our jaws drop to the floor with her rendition of ‘Bad Blood’. It was Aubrey’s first time in Dubai and she definitely got the crowd dancing and laughing as she cracked jokes on stage, then performed ‘Give it away’. She also took off her shoes at the end and did a one hand cartwheel – I know crazy, right? 😀 – what a performer! Not to mention, Aubrey also played the Trombone, so we started wondering is there anything this woman CAN’T DO. Postmodern Jukebox got their awesome Tap Dancer Sarah Reich after their 7th song, where she got in a battle with the drummer which blew everyone’s mind away, then the cellist and the entire band joined in to play all the different themes to Star Wars including the main theme, ‘Imperial March’ and ‘the Cantina soundtrack’. While playing ‘All about the Bass’ the cellist performed a solo that was both inspiring and oozing with greatness, he had the crowd bowing down. At the end of their performance they all stood and took a selfie with the crowed.

While waiting for the next band to set up on stage, I had a small chat with Jad Abi Haidar who was very excited to watch Toto play. Surprisingly, Jad was also one of the contestants in The Voice who happened to reach the finale and now he travels around the region from Egypt to Morocco to Dubai and many more performing with “8eart’’ a company based in Lebanon. I asked Jad what was his favorite song for Toto and he said, ‘I will remember’.
The English rock band from Manchester James is finally ready to get on stage after facing a bit of technical problems that led to a small delay till about 9:15. Before I start talking about the performance I need to say that I had never heard of them before, and I honestly thought it was a weird name for a band, but after watching them I went home and downloaded the entire discography – which doesn’t happen very often by the way. They started with ‘Rain’ which was a very chill song the kind that makes you wanna wave your arms in the air and sway left and right, what really caught my attention is how the front man was dancing in the most random fashion, it was like the music had strings attached to him and was moving him without any control from his side whatsoever. I soon learned why he is this way when he started to tell the story behind their second song ‘Moving on’.

‘’The next song is about my mother who died in my arms 2 years ago, it was a beautiful death which is something that you don’t hear a lot of people say nowadays that death can be beautiful, it was more of a rebirth’’
With those chilling words he went on to say that there is a video clip done by BAFTA award-winning animator Ainslie Henderson and it is now used in Hospices – a home providing care for the terminally ill – for children who ask about death in order to ease their passing, safe to say I felt Goosebumps all over and my eyes started to water, this is when I realized he was one of those people who are in tune with nature and had a beautiful soul. One of the funny things that kept happening was that they were discussing on stage which song to play next, ‘’We just make this up as we go along’’ they finally chose a sappy romantic song while the entire band was singing as backup and playing Harmonica beautifully, and this was when James jumped off stage, went past the fan pit and the golden circle and went to the middle of the general admission crowd and started singing his heart out. This was breathtaking and a very nice touch if you ask me.

The moment we’ve been all waiting for was here. Toto made their way to the stage performing their first song ‘You supply the love’, I think the reason this event was held outdoors was because if it had a roof, the crowd’s cheers would’ve blown it off to ‘Kingdom Come’. After some thank you’s and some witty jokes they introduced their long time friend Lenny Castro on stage with them to help them pay tribute to all the friends they lost this year in specific Maurice White from Earth, Wind and Fire who tragically passed away earlier this month. The pianist then plays while singing which completely blew the crowds mind away but before that he asks the crowd which hat suits him better while he switched hats which was quite funny. Fun doesn’t end here because then their great guitarist plays an amazing solo that melted the entire crowd’s faces. The drummer gives the crowd a glimpse of his awesome talent by playing a solo on his drums. To end this beautiful night with a great song Toto then does an extra Encore the crowd was asking for ‘AFRICA’, they played a prolonged version of the song with each member taking time to play a special solo and they also did an awesome crowd chant ending the night on a very high note (pun intended :D)

Written By: Rim El Jurdi & Ahmed S. Khalil
Photography by: Hasan Kaissi
Edited by: NJ Bakr

– Have you missed our reviews for other days at the festival? Here is Day Two and Day Three.
– For our photography coverage you can find on our Facebook page through here.

One of the great things that make the Jazz Festival so special is that it’s all about the music, but in a very chilled atmosphere. There are two stages that acts perform on, a main stage that’s used on weekends and a smaller stage during the weekdays. This year the Jazz Festival has launched a great concept; you can register online and attend the gigs on the smaller stage during the weekdays for FREE! All you have to do is register online and print out the registration paper. Easy, free, and a guaranteed enjoyment of a great night out. The parking issue a lot of people faced the previous years was also fixed, there’s a whole huge sand area dedicated to concert attendees now. It’s easy to find and not as far as the parking the previous years. There are also shuttle buses that will pick you up from or drop you to Dubai Festival City Center.

As mentioned above, the smaller stage, also known as “Toyota Stage” is for smaller acts on weekdays. In front of the stage are lots of wooden benches, so people can really sit down, relax and enjoy the music while having a good bite or a nice drink. There are several food and drinks booths at the venue, including Pizza, Hotdogs, Coffee or alcoholic beverages. A new concept was introduced this year; At the food/beverage booths you cannot pay directly, you have to purchase coupons at a special stall and ‘pay’ with these vouchers. The coupons are sold as 50dhs vouchers and you can buy goods in that worth. In addition to that, there are various art stalls that offer handmade goods, paintings and jewelry. It’s definitely worth a look. There also is a whole stall for Melody House, musical instruments. They are more than happy to allow you to try out different instruments and who knows, discover some hidden talents maybe?

Overall, there’s a lot to do. The music is the focal point, but apart from that there are several interesting things and places you can check out WHILE enjoying the music.

If you’d planned to go to the Jazz festival don’t forget to:

• If you’re going during the week, register online, print out your registration confirmation, and enjoy the night for free!
• For food and beverages purchase a coupon rather than first getting into a queue and then having to leave again to purchase a coupon.
• Don’t carry big notes with you, chances are, change is hard to find.
• There are lots of goodies to collect, so stroll around and check out the different booths
• Have fun and enjoy the music.
• Bring a jacket; it gets really chilly at night!

Reviewed by: Jamie Tofu

Photography by: Alexandr Antozzi