Cape Jazz tunes booked

Musos: Musicians and contributors to the Cape Jazz Collection include Charles Louw, Jannie van Tonder, Colin Miller and Buddy Wells.

UCT jazz graduate and arts project manager Colin Miller has launched the first Cape Jazz Collection, a book of original tunes by South African composers, at UCT's South African College of Music. The event saw some of the Cape's legendary jazz musicians and a room of music aficionados gather to toast the first ever book of Cape Jazz sheet music.

The title was five years in the making and features 39 original compositions by musicians such as Merton Barrow, Hilton and Tony Schilder, Robbie Jansen, Mike Campbell, Mac McKenzie, Mark Fransman and Winston Mankunku. It constitutes, say the editors, an extremely useful resource for music educators, musicians and bands, and signals a landmark development in the documentation and publication of local music, which is extremely un-resourced in this area.

"Originally the ambition was to produce a South African Jazz Real Book, but with limited resources at our disposal, it became clear that the costs in terms of research, editing and publishing were too high for a national focus," said Miller, who received assistance from several local musicians in compiling the collection. "Hence we have restricted it to a more manageable collection of jazz compositions from the Cape."

That SA jazz book is on the backburner for now, but not forgotten.

The Cape Jazz Collection is available online or at some local music-instrument retail outlets.