Jazz state of the city begins

The Akbank Jazz Festival, one of the longest-running festivals in Turkey, is celebrating its 27th year. The festival, which has brought together a gamut of prestigious names of the jazz world such as Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp, McCoy Tyner, Pharoah Sanders, Jimmy Smith, Enrico Rava, John Scofield & Joe Lovano, Manu Katché and David Sanborn, will illuminate the different colors of jazz all over the city between Nov. 3 and 19.

Among the stars to take the stage this year, some of the names are: Abdullah Ibrahim, a chief composer-pianist of modern jazz, Abdullah Ibrahim & Ekaya and Hugh Masekela, consisting of Ekaya resurrecting the soul of The Jazz Epistles - the first all-black bebop jazz group of South Africa - and Hugh Masekela, another jazz icon of South Africa, Vanessa Rubin, one of the great international ambassadors of jazz, Ala.Ni, whose songs have been listened to over 2.5 million times on digital platforms to date, Wolfgang Muthspiel, a jazz guitarist who left marks on his generation, Ecuadorian producer and musician Nicola Cruz, British producer and musician Bonobo, Norwegian tuba player and composer  Daniel Herskedal, instrumentalist and composer Marius Neset, one of the 25 young jazz musicians who are expected to steer the future of jazz, Amina Figarova Sextet, who combine classical music discipline with moving rhythms and bright harmonies, Cuban jazz pianist and composer Alfredo Rodríguez, American drummer and producer Mark Guilliana, British saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings with The Ancestors, consisting of South African musicians, and Red Baraat, one of the important names of Mop Mop and Acid Jazz, combining post-modern jazz style with funk, Afro rhythms and exotic sounds. The festival, which will host Kenan Doğulu and Sattas under the...