Mo Jazz Music Festival returns to open-air environs of Rose Park. Meet the lineup

Each season comes with returns, as we welcome back natural features and cultural traditions.

The reappearance of fall in mid-Missouri means tuning to a strain of jazz that mingles with nature’s own sounds and genres. Next month, the Mo Jazz Music Festival will come back to Rose Park for its seventh year.

But the festival stretches further still, a “reconfiguration” of sorts of the Capital JazzFest that ran for 26 years in our state’s capital, organizers with Jazz Forward Initiative noted.

This year’s Mo Jazz Music Festival will both soothe and surprise with elements listeners have grown accustomed to — a free day of jazz that stretches to border funk, R&B and more — as well as fresh faces and interpretations in song.

Here’s a brief look at this year’s lineup:

Huney Knuckles with Skylar Tang

This year’s headliners hail from San Francisco, creating something dynamic from a seasoned lineup that features guitar, saxophone, drums and keyboard bass. This time out, they’ll incorporate the talents of a fellow Bay Area artist: Skylar Tang, a young and gifted trumpeter who is honing her craft at New York City institutions of higher music. Together, these players will offer jazz wrapped in blankets of funk and soul.

Sam Fribush Organ Trio

Convening one of jazz’s great configurations, this North Carolina keyboardist gladly owes debts to everyone from organ giants like Lonnie Smith to modern artists such as Madlib and D’Angelo, according to his website. Fribush’s skills have earned him time playing alongside everyone from jazz stalwart Charlie Hunter to indie-folk master Hiss Golden Messenger.

Dawn Weber and Good Company

A fest favorite — this year marks her fifth appearance — the St. Louis trumpeter and singer places her irons in numerous musical fires, playing stripped-down, genre-hyphenated sets as well as arranging bands that observe nearly every conceivable angle on funk. Weber’s set this year will focus on Latin jazz sounds, organizers noted in an email.

Mr. Fun

One of two locally-forged acts to play this year, Mr. Fun features some of Columbia’s finest on their respective instruments; the lineup includes, but isn’t necessarily limited to, such trusted names as Sean Hennessy, Kevin Hennessy, Pete Szkolka and Jake Hanselman.

More: Marsalis, Metheny and more join Columbia jazz series season. Here’s a look at the lineup

Manga Feo with Aina Cook

Singer Aina Cook lives out this ensemble’s moniker, which translates from Malagasy to “blue” or “beautiful” voice, according to organizers. Cook, who boasts a powerful and sensitive natural instrument, will receive suitable backing from one of the area’s great jazz incubators, playing with past and present students of Loyd Warden and his A-Frame studio.

Mo Jazz Music Festival begins at 1 p.m. Sept. 13 in Rose Park. Learn more about this year’s festival and Jazz Forward Initiative at https://www.mojazz.net/index.html and https://rosemusichall.com/event/mo-jazz-music-festival/.

Aarik Danielsen is the features and culture editor for the Tribune. Contact him at [email protected]. He’s on Twitter/X @aarikdanielsen.

This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: Mo Jazz festival will feature these national, regional and local acts