The exhibition "Jazz PFO" opened in the Nizhny Novgorod park "Switzerland".

      The exhibition "Jazz PFO" opened in the Nizhny Novgorod park "Switzerland". As reported by the correspondent of IA "NTA-Volga", on June 1, the exhibition on the history of jazz in the Volga Federal District (PFO) opened in the Nizhny Novgorod park "Switzerland". The stands feature stories of the jazz movement in cities and the stories of people. The list of cities includes: Yoshkar-Ola, Perm, Saransk, Kirov, and others. Additionally, it tells about musicians and educators over the decades who created a unique scene, often against the odds. For instance, in Mari El, the pioneer of jazz performance was the "Orbita" orchestra, formed in the 1960s by students of the forestry technical institute. Later, the group was granted the status of a folk ensemble. At that time, swing and bebop enthusiasts gathered for dances at the music school, where official programs were replaced by jazz sets. Many informally exchanged "signature" vinyl records and records "on the ribs" there. In the 1990s, jazz life in the capital of the republic was shaped around pianist and educator Sergey Belov. Lectures and jam sessions grew into large city festivals. A significant event was the emergence in 1997 of the "Only Children in Jazz" competition-festival at the Tchaikovsky School of Arts, which over time grew from a modest school event into a notable project. Since 2021, the "Jazz Mari" ensemble, led by Sergey Belov, has been operating in the republic. In Mordovia, jazz enthusiasts appeared as early as the late 1950s. In the absence of sound recording, musicians arranged themes heard on the radio. A real breakthrough occurred with the emergence of the pop-jazz ensemble "Ornament," which toured the entire USSR with the "Komsomolskaya Pravda" agit-train and received the Lenin Komsomol Prize. A new stage in creative direction began in 1995 with the creation of the "Saransk" big band, which included teachers from the college and soloists from the musical theater. The success of the ensemble received support from the authorities, allowing them to acquire quality instruments. In 2002, the first international festival "Veise-Jazz" (translated from Mordovian as "together") took place, where jazzmen such as Georgy Garanyan and David Goloshchekin performed with the orchestra. Today, some musicians in the region successfully work at the intersection of Mordovian melody and jazz, such as the "Torama-jazz" project. The first jazz festivals "Cheba-jazz" in the capital of Chuvashia took place in 1986, 1988, 1990, and 2000. The initiator was trumpeter and leader of the "Jazz Forum" group Nikolai Kuzmichev. The celebration began with a column of trucks with playing musicians passing through the central streets. Many jazz musicians in the country still remember the festival emblem—a yellow saxophonist duck and the incredible hospitality of Cheboksary residents. In 1991, at the initiative of Nikolai Kuzmichev, a pop-jazz department was established at the Cheboksary Music College. Today, Chuvash musicians successfully assert themselves in all-Russian competitions. For example, the orchestra of pop and jazz music of the Chuvash State Academic Symphony Chapel became the winner of the First All-Russian Jazz Ensemble Competition of Igor Butman’s Foundation. The exhibition on the histories of the jazz movement also included a city from the Kirov region, where the first sounds of jazz were brought to Vyatka (Kirov) back in the 1930s by touring jazz bands and orchestras. During the war years, evacuated musicians played on the stages of the drama theater and the House of the Red Army, forming temporary brigades. It was in Kirov, during evacuation, that one of the most interesting Soviet jazz musicians—trumpeter Andrey Tovmasyan—was born. The situation radically changed in 1999 with the opening of the first jazz club by Vyacheslav Bratukhin. Since 2004, the development of jazz in the city has been led by guitarist and producer Nikolai Donetsky, who created the "Jazz-Vyatka Big Band" (later Big Show Band). From 2012 for ten years, the "Jazz-Vyatka" festival gathered dozens of ensembles from 15 countries.