Panamá Tourism and Culture

   Leave it to Danilo Pérez to treat Panamanian jazz fans with something that we never heard before and never expected, along with the more or less known quantities. This year it was Edmar Castañeda, who plays jazz influenced by Colombian traditional music on his harp, accompanied by trombonist Marshall Gilkes, drummer Dave Silliman and vocalist Andrea Tierra. Billed number three behind a Panamanian all-star selection led by Pérez and drummer Billy Cobham and singer Nnenna Freelon's tight band, Castañeda's act grabbed the fans' attention and applause as much for the performances by Tierra and Gilkes as for the novel and wonderful sounds coming out of that harp.

   In a Panama Jazz Festival dedicated to the late Panamanian jazz singer Barbara Wilson it was fitting that Andrea Tierra, Nnenna Freelon, Mili Bermejo, Patricia Vlieg and Idania Dowman came through with vocal performances ranging from solid to amazing. Until Friday night's last performance it seemed that the women and children had clearly stolen the show.

   Children? As in pianist Tony Machuca from Miami and percussionist Milagros Blades from Panama, both so brilliant and both still looking ahead to their 13th birthdays. As in Panamanian teenager Jahaziel Arrocha, so talented at playing other people's saxophones but too poor to have one of his own, whose performances were so compelling that he came away from the festival with both a new instrument and a summer school scholarship to the prestigious Berklee College of Music.