It’s deep night. The people of New Orleans are asleep. The lights in most houses are turned off. The musical life on the streets of the city is just beginning to flourish. The soft sounds of a trombone blend into the night and flow quietly and casually at first. In a house, in a children’s room, a boy wakes up. He listens attentively to the nostalgic melody. After a while he hears, from somewhere else in the street, the answer of the cornet. The spontaneous improvisation of the theme develops as more instruments join: clarinet, tuba, banjo, drum. The musical battle of the bands begins and lasts until dawn. When the siren of a steamboat from a distant harbour creeps into the music, the whistle of a train rolling somewhere into space, or the milkman’s cart rattling along the street, the musicians pack up their instruments.

During this concert we will move to the south of the United States, where jazz was born. Over a hundred years ago in New Orleans, Louisiana, bands began to form, thanks to which music genres such as blues, ragtime, spirituals appeared. In this port city full of cars, trams and heavy traffic, bands staged parades, giving impromptu street-style musical performances to a wide audience. At night, the streets of New Orleans resounded with musical duels of bands that lasted until dawn.

The street scenes in which the musicians will engage the listeners of this concert will help to understand how New Orleans jazz was born, how deep the roots of this music go and what it is about. They will explain what improvisation is, why traditional jazz music is dominated by wind instruments and tell us how the fate of the boy who listened with such interest to musical duels of bands at night turned out.