Update: Read more about the Cape Town International Jazz Festival 2009.

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If one looks at the 21-artists announced today, there is no doubt that the 2008 Cape Town International Jazz Festival will go down as the ‘Festival of the Guitars’. On top of this Brasilian Sérgio Mendes will be coming to Cape Town for the festival!

Leading the musician pack is award-winning US guitarist Lee Ritenour. Joining Ritenour as part of the line-up is the rising star of the jazz guitar Lionel Loueke who comes from Benin, South African-based Mozambican guitarist Jimmy Dludlu, guitarist Kunle Ayo from Nigeria and US soul vocalist/guitarist Raul Midón.

Also on stage is a string of South African guitarists who will perform with the Bebop Guitars, a US band constituted by members of the guitar faculty at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, Massachusetts. The six guitar units join Zimbabwean guitarist/vocalist Oliver Mtukudzi.

Another second-time visitor to the Cape Town International Jazz Festival is Benin’s Lionel Loueke. This round, Loueke appears at the Cape Town International Jazz Festival with his trio, Gilfema made up of the guitarist, Hungarian drummer/percussionist Ferenc Nemeth and bassist Massimo Biolcati who is of Italian descent although he grew up in Sweden.

But not everything in the new line-up is about guitar strumming. The two other headliners are vibraphonist Mike Mainieri & Steps Ahead, Javon Jackson Super Band and Dutch saxophonist Candy Dulfer. There is also South Africa’s multi-instrumentalist Zim Ngqawana who leads his new Zimology Quartet and our own songstress Vicky Sampson who bounced back with her new album released in 2007.

On the experimental side the new line-up is bountiful with different collaborations put up for the festival. One such collaboration is between South African drummer Kesivan Naidoo, Mozambican djembe and mbira-player Rolando Lamussene and two Swiss drummers – Peter Conradin Zumthor and Lucas Niggli. Having connected in 2007, the quartet which calls itself the Beat Bag Bohemia toured Switzerland and Germany in 2007.

The second collaboration is between a South African piano-bass-drum trio Offshore and trumpeter Marcus Wyatt. Saxophonist Buddy Wells will join the collaboration. Another attractive collaboration for those who are into more youthful genres is that of Kolo Novo Movie Band.

But a real eye-opener will be an Indo-Jazz fusion band, Quartet Babu. The four Cape Town-based musicians combine jazz forms and harmonies with Indian ragas and talas to create pulsating music and energy-loaded impulses.

The complete list of the musicians that were announced today is: a 51-year old close vocal harmony group African Inkspots (RSA), Beat Bag Bohemia (Mozambique/RSA /Switzerland), Bebop Guitars (US/RSA), Candy Dulfer (Netherlands), Darius and the UKZN Rolling Reunion Band (RSA), Javon Jackson Super Band featuring Jimmy Cobb, Jimmy Dludlu (RSA), Kolo Novo Movie Band (RSA), Kunle Ayo (Nigeria), Lee Ritenour (US), Lionel Loueke (Benin/US), Mike Mainieri & Steps Ahead (RSA), Offshore featuring Buddy Wells and Marcus Wyatt, Raul Midón (US), Quartet Babu, hip-hop group Skwatta Kamp (RSA), The Little Giants (RSA) youth band, rap group Timbuktu & Damn featuring Zoro (Sweden), vocalist Wanda Baloyi (RSA), Vicky Sampson (RSA) and Zimology Quartet (RSA)

This 21 adds to the initial list announced in November 2007 : Ananda Project (US); Bongani Sotshononda Project (RSA); Gavin Minter with the Mother City Jazz Orchestra (RSA); Gerald Albright (US); Hiromi (Japan); Kenny Barron Trio (US); Lennart Åberg Band (Sweden) feat. Peter Erskine (US); Leslie Klein-Smith & Mother City Groove (RSA); Oliver Mtukudzi (Zimbabwe); Sérgio Mendes (Brazil/US), Standard Bank National Youth Jazz Band (RSA); The Bays (US); Najee (US); The Big Idea (RSA); The Four Sounds feat Zelda Benjamin & Phyllis Madikwa (RSA); The Manhattans feat. Gerald Alston & Blue Lovett (US); The Soul Brother (RSA); Tierney Sutton (US); Tutu Puoane (RSA/Belgium); and Zola (RSA).

Read the initial article on the line-up with more information on the Jazz musicians performing in the