The 40th edition of Jazz em Agosto, which runs from the 1st to the 11th of August, will bring together the musical choices that the executive and artistic director considers “the most striking and challenging in jazz and creative music that is less accommodated at the present time”, says the organization in a statement sent to the Lusa agency.

This year, the festival begins on the 1st with the Red Lily quintet, led by saxophonist James Brandon Lewis, who will pay tribute to the role of gospel singer and civil rights activist Mahalia Jackson.

James Brandon Lewis will return to the stage the following day, on 2 August, as part of the project headed by the “prodigious guitarist” Ava Mendoza and bassist Davin Hoff, “inspired by the love they share for references as diverse as Black Flag hardcore and jazz- Ornette Coleman's Prime Time funk.”

In this project, “played by 'punk rockers' with a serious talent for improvisation and a deep sense of jazz”, drummer Ches Smith also participates.

Guitarist Bill Orcutt performs on 3 August in a quartet format, with three other guitarists: Ava Mendoza, Shane Parish and Wendy Eisenberg.

“In one of the most beautiful and unusual albums of recent years, Bill Orcutt recorded himself playing four guitars, putting together a puzzle of several circular and minimalist registers on the electric guitar. The desire to bring the album to life on stage led Orcutt to put together a magnificent quartet with which he recreates his compositions and ventures into completely unknown terrain”, says the Jazz em Agosto organization.

Drummer Lucas Nigli brings to the festival, on 4 August, the debate Sound of Serendipity, called for “a composition operated by a game of cards, always on the border between written music and improvisation, always on a knife's edge”.

In this group, “the drums command, without fear of the 'groove', and flute, voice, accordion, tuba or organ orbit in a spectacular whirlpool around Lucas Nigli”.

The Move trio, which brings together drummer João Valinho, saxophonist Yedo Gibson, and bassist Felipe Zenícola, in whose music “there are pieces of jazz, funk, kuduro, punk, frevo, heavy metal and breakbeat in a rush, all suggestions that never arrive to be based, on a practice of constant stylistic shifts and permanent dissatisfaction”, they perform on 5 August.

On 6 August, the performance of the trio The Selva is scheduled, which brings together “three of the most original and creative Portuguese musicians”: Ricardo Jacinto, on cello and electronics, Gonçalo Almeida, on double bass and electronics, and Nuno Morão, on drums and percussion.

The trio, which makes “chamber music in total freedom and with hypnotic potential”, will present its most recent album, “Camarão-Girafa”.

On 7 August, the trio led by Brandon Seabrook presents itself, who “works with hallucinatory landscapes, a cutting humour, recurring aesthetic and register changes”. “Accompanied by Gerald Cleaver (drums and electronics) and Pascal Niggenkemper (double bass), Seabrook explores unusual areas on the guitar and, above all, on the unusual banjo he brings to this lineup”, says the festival organizers.

On 8 August, “fLuxKit Vancouver” is presented, “an amazing composition by saxophonist Darius Jones, divided into four movements and resulting from a commission from the Western Front Arts Center, in Vancouver, Canada”.

On the 9th, it's time for “a special project dedicated to the life of [composer and saxophonist] Anthony Braxton”, The Locals, by pianist Pat Thomas.

The organization of Jazz em Agosto states that “although Braxton's work has a recognized rational and complex personality, Thomas' arrangements for the quintet The Locals, maintaining the rigor of Braxton's writing, give it a playful dimension, many voices on the border with rock and funk”.

Trumpeter Peter Evans, “one of the most inventive, original, and challenging musicians today”, takes the stage on August 10, with the band Being & Becoming, which also includes Joel Ross (vibraphone and percussion), Nick Jozwiak ( double bass) and Michael Shekwoaga Ode (drums).

Jazz em Agosto ends on the 11th with Fire! Orchestra, a super formation of 16 elements, which includes, among others, saxophonist and flutist Mats Gustafsson, double bassist Johan Berthling, guitarist Julien Desprez, trumpeter Susana Santos Silva and saxophonist and clarinetist Fredrik Ljungkvist.

The shows mentioned above all take place at the Open Air Amphitheater of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, in Lisbon.

The Grand Auditorium will host three performances: on 3 August, Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring” will be celebrated, in a version for two pianos by Sylvie Courvoisier and Cory Smythe; on the 9th, DJ, composer, and video artist dieb13 takes the stage, “leading an armada of 14 musicians who are experts in experimental environments”; and on August 11th, Black Duck will perform, “a product of Chicago’s immense and thriving creative fertility”.

Auditorium 2 hosts a meeting between “the magnetic guitar” by Norberto Lobo, the “cello of great amplitude (from folk to avant-garde jazz)” ​​by Helena Espvall, and “the violin that walks the tangent between classical and experimental music” by Maria Rocha, on 2 August; the duo Ava Mendoza, with her “untamed guitar”, and Gabby Fluke—Mogul, and her “disruptive violin”, on 4 August; and Made of Bones, “a Portuguese sextet that explored with enormous creativity the connection to cinematic music and the assumed heritage of an implosion of genres in the vein of John Zorn's Naked City”, on 10 August.

Ticket prices for Jazz em Agosto concerts vary between seven and 20 euros. In addition to individual tickets, there are passes available (which include five, six or 14 concerts), prices varying between 65 and 130 euros.