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A CONSTANTLY GROWING schedule of cultural events prepared the community for businessman Carl Jefferson’s idea to start an outdoor summer jazz festival. Planned by a committee of 20 citizens, the first Concord Summer Festival was held in the open at the Concord Boulevard Neighborhood Park on August 26. 1969. Jazz enthusiasts from all over Northern California came to hear such artists as Oscar Peterson, Pearl Bailey Peter Nero, George Shearing, Ella Fitzgerald, Gerry Mulligan, and Dave Brubeck. Performances by the San Francisco and Oakland symphonies were also popular. The festival grew to such proportions, both in audience numbers and in performance quality, that music critics from the New York Times and Saturday Review compared it favorably to Woodstock and Wolf Trap. Andrews, Page 192 |
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