WE EXIST!

Jazz, empowerment and the primal force of music

She is a true jazz legend – Dee Dee Bridgewater, born in 1950 in Memphis, Tennessee, returns to Weimar following her sensational concert two years ago! Her presence on stage is electrifying. Her voice sends a shiver down your spine. Her pure delight in music-making gives Dee Dee Bridgewater the energy of ten people – and can be felt in every note and phrase this primal force of jazz unleashes. Whether in sensitive ballads, soulful songs or wild bebop scats she has thrilled audiences around the world. Over four decades the three-time Grammy award-winner has risen to become one of the very top jazz vocalists: she is well known for adding her own touch to masterly renditions of jazz classics and her ability to move seamlessly between the genres of jazz, blues, r&b and soul.

Her new programme is entitled “We Exist!” – a battle cry that empowers (not only) black women and reflects on a journey that is by no means finished. “We Exist!” is a homage to feminist activism in the arts and as an art form. She will combine rousing protest songs such as “Mississippi Goddam” and “Trying Times” with popular jazz standards of past and present. In doing so, she shows how far we have already come and the way we have left to go. Her musical director is the pianist Carmen Staaf. To highlight young women artists, on her European tour she is performing with Rosa Brunello and Evita Polidoro – two talented and sought-after musicians. Schallkultur and Kunstfest Weimar present this co-operation as a summer “Kunstfest Prélude”.

Event relocated to Erbenhof Weimar