Dave Brubeck, Jazz Pianist
Brought Jazz To His Hometown
In 2019 the Concord Jazz Festival Committee in Concord, California, hired me to design an illustrated map for the 50th anniversary of the jazz festival. The map was available for free to festival attendees.
I live in Concord. During the pandemic my husband and I walked the 3 mile roundtrip to our neighborhood park, Dave Brubeck Park. When we moved to the city in 2016 the park's name didn't make sense to me. I knew Brubeck was a great jazz pianist. One of my favorite albums is Take Five by The Dave Brubeck Quartet. Was the park really named after Brubeck or was it named for an influential local resident? The answer was both.
From my research for the jazz festival map I learned Brubeck (illustration) was born in Concord. He frequently returned to Concord to perform. On the west end of the park is a mound with a concrete slab. He performed on the slab when the park was the original site of the Concord Summer Festival, later known as the Concord Jazz Festival. Opening as “The House That Jazz Built,” the festival led to the construction of the Concord Pavilion.
An excerpt from local newspaper The Pioneer, “Local auto dealer and jazz devotee Carl Jefferson developed the idea of the festival and guided it through its years in the park and then at the new Pavilion. From the festival’s success sprang the Concord Jazz record label started in Concord in 1973 when Jefferson realized that many of the legendary jazz musicians who came to the festival were unable to get their music recorded and released.”
On the days when we finish our roundtrip trek to Dave Brubeck Park I appreciate our local tour of jazz history.