John Scofield and Cyrille Aimée are the stars of Turku Sea Jazz in July!

6.4.2022

The urban and marine Turku Sea Jazz will be held on 29–30 July in front of the Forum Marinum Maritime Centre by the Aura river. The audience gets to enjoy the hottest rhythms of Finnish and international jazz as well as wonderful food experiences.

The legendary John Scofield crowns the Turku Sea Jazz festival Friday with his band! John Scofield (born 1951) is an American jazz guitarist and composer. “Sco” hit people’s consciousness in the 1980’s in Miles Davis albums. Scofield is an elaborately versatile artist and handles the rhythms of soul, hip hop, jazz and rock.

John Scofield’s newest project is named Yankee Go Home. Scofield embraces American rock and folk hits and seasons them with his fifty years of jazz experience. The quartet boldly seizes classics from Neil Young to Buddy Holly and Stevie Wonder to Leonard Bernstein.

Scofield has gathered an experienced group for this project with musicians known from Cassandra Wilson’s and Robert Glasper’s bands. He has John Cowherd on the keyboard, Vicente Archer on bass and Josh Dion on drums. A creative touch and seamless communication can be heard in their playing as they adventure through rock, funk, country and jazz. 

The charismatic, French-born Cyrille Aimée (born 1984) delights the Turku Sea Jazz audience with a serving of international glamour on Saturday. Aimée has rapidly taken a place as one of her generation’s most followed and awarded jazz singers. French-Dominican roots and a passion for gypsy jazz are a big source of inspiration to Aimée, who charms the listeners with her soft voice and skillful improvisation. 

Aimée has settled in New York where she is also known as a Broadway actress. She has won the Montreux Jazz and Sarah Vaughan song contests and been nominated in the Grammy awards. The New York Times has described Aimée as a mixture of Michael Jackson and Sarah Vaughan.

Pepe Willberg & Jukka Eskola Statement and Jukka Perko PreBoppers have been published earlier. The whole festival program will be set in May.

Summer brings a new, interesting collaboration between the jazz festival, Maritime Center and local restaurants. Turku Food & Wine curates a wine bar, artisan brewery and three top restaurants which are to be announced later during spring.

Turku Sea Jazz is one of the four events in the Archipelago Sea Jazz festival series which also includes Baltic Jazz, Korpo Sea Jazz and the new Åland Sea Jazz. The audience can support John Nurminen Foundation’s work for saving the Baltic Sea when purchasing tickets at Tiketti.