2002 Importance of the festival for the region, musicians and listeners
		The main significance of the festival for the Brno region can be found in rounding out the cultural offer in different musical genres, necessary for every regional center. This is especially true if the cultural event is international. The international aspect enhances the value of such enterprises together with refining the city image and improving its cultural offer. Brno, with its ideal location between the major middle and eastern European cities such as Vienna, Budapest, Krakow and Prague, hosts many international business, sport and cultural events, including international classical music festivals. The lack of a three or more-day jazz festival has been obvious for some time now and this lack thereof was indeed one of the inspirations for the organizers of Jazzfest Brno. Needless to say, the festival performers can draw almost solely on the positive elements of its existence, such as a chance to complete new, sometimes exclusive bands for such events, an opportunity to present a new repertoire, compare their abilities with strong native and international competition, not only during the main concerts, but at the jamsessions as well. Naturally, the audience can appreciate the possibility to compare levels of native and foreign players and to experience many different performances concentrated within a very limited time period. The maximum limit in Brno's case is probably (being aware of the cultural situation and the interest in jazz in the region) four or five consecutive days. The accompanying projects such as well attended jamsessions with the presence of the top festival performers enable the audience to identify itself with the festival and furthermore attract a wider audience to attend a complete event.

		Impulses and inspirations for organizing the festival
		The above mentioned market gap has apparently been the strongest influence on the organizers at the early stage of the idea's development. The main goal of the organizers is therefore to continue with improving the festival to a project with an international significance, which can considerably affect the importance of Brno as a major central European city. Another influence, which cannot be omitted, is the stagnation of the Czech jazz scene. This is far more profound problem, which requires more detailed analysis, but the organizers hope that events such as Jazzfest Brno can help to stir up the creative process among Czech and especially Moravian jazz musicians. Not only a direct comparison with foreign performers at the jamsessions can be a strong motivational factor. Due to the fact the organizers of the festival are musicians themselves, it is clear they are personally involved in bringing the top quality performers to feature at the festival, including their favorites.

		Specifity of the Jazzfest Brno 2002
		The main trait of the festival is its concert format. After experiencing a few traditional jazz festivals in the Czech Republic and abroad, the organizers assumed that a series of five separate concerts would be more suitable for the audience. Usually, the listeners become bored and tired during the festival evening, watching a few short performances, waiting a few hours for the main feature of the day, which, obviously, must come at the end of the show. To avoid this problem, separate concerts were organized. The outcome was successful and therefore enables the organizers to continue with this strategy in the following years. Furthermore, the accompanying projects such as jamsessions and workshops proved to be successful and contributed to a good over-all impression of the festival. The Jazzfest organizational team aims to extend these activities and it will endeavor to hire top festival performers for such projects in the following years.

		Promotion of the festival, graphic style and website, media collaboration
		The graphic style of the festival promotion materials and the web site will be unified, as for the first year of the festival were both designed by different persons. The promoter believes that selected graphic image will appeal to all potential generations of listeners. The need to spread the information about the project to as wide range of listeners as possible leads the team to develop more or less ordinary ways to promote the festival in and out of the region. It contains well aimed promotion campaign including billboard, posters, distribution of leaflets and programs, regular and reciprocal advertising, radio and TV commercials and announcements, ticket contests, an Internet banner campaign and web presentation, sending SMS, spreading the information among musicians and acquaintances, etc. The tickets are distributed in conventional ways including an Internet and telephone reservation system. It is essential to meticulously select media partners. One regional and two national radio stations were chosen and their two-week campaign covered daily more than 300,000 potential listeners. It featured, apart from other musical programs, interviews with the organizers and announcements. Czech public TV produced a ten-minute program about the festival and highlighted the event ahead of time. MF Dnes, a national daily newspaper published many articles about the festival, including an interview with the main star of the event, Diane Schuur. Articles and reviews appeared in many other national and regional newspapers. Magazines Muzikus and Harmonie were selected as main media partners among the monthly magazines, and they presented commercial advertisements and feature articles about the festival performers. Cooperation with the Internet server Jazzdnes has been established and their activities were boosted by a massive banner campaign on the most visited Czech web sites.

		Technical backup arrangements for the performers
		The promoter has succeeded in establishing a cooperation with one of the nicest hotels in Brno, The Royal Ricc, a member of the Romantic Hotels network. The result of this collaboration was a full content of the performers with the accommodation and therefore it will be sustained to the following years. wo taxi cabs and one comfortable minibus were used for transportation of the performers during the festival. Demanded top quality instruments including drum set, bass and concert grand piano were provided for the musicians according to the riders. The Audioline company was selected for providing the sound system. This choice proved satisfactory. Small partial problems were immediately fixed and the audience's feedback regarding the sound quality has been almost solely positive.

		Selection of venues for festival projects
		The concert format of the festival enabled the promoter to pick the venues carefully according to the needs of the performers. All venues were located in the center of the city, walking distance from one another. Two of the festival evenings and all jamsessions occured in the Edison Garden hall and jazz cafe, both of which proved as suitable choices with its atmosphere and decent acoustics. The main show on Friday night took place in the atrium of the International Business Center. The major reason for this selection was complete technical backup, high quality dressing rooms and other features, especially suitable to the needs of the sponsors. The last venue, The Livingstone's Music Club hosted two festival concerts, which matched with its specific environment. The dramaturge has started focusing on other suitable venues in Brno, which could fulfill the needs of the festival performers in the future.

		Conclusion, future of the festival
		To sum it up, it is appropriate to repeat already mentioned directions of the development. In the dramaturgy line it will be to diversify the genre offer, extending the participation of foreign performers with emphasis on performers from the USA, improving the accompanying projects. In the organization line, it is planned to broaden the offer of available venues and extending the festival period to four days. In the financial line, the promoter intends to find not only more sponsors, but to focus on more significant cooperation with the town hall and the Ministry of Culture as well. The successful course of the first year of the festival entitles the organizers to hope that Brno's jazz fans are expecting an extension of the festival period as well as broadening the genre range and featuring even more attractive performers. All above mentioned should allow a birth of a new festival tradition, which jazz listeners in Brno definitely deserve.

		© 2002 JAZZFESTBRNO