By Toni Nicholas

Jazz on the Square, an event which started off as a fringe event and has grown into a main event which has rivaled the main-stage Jazz shows, did not have the easiest time for sponsors this year according to organizers. Ironically the event is organized by the St Lucia Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture, the island’s largest grouping of private sector businesses.

This year, what was primarily free lunchtime concerts, shifted to focus on evening concerts, dubbed sunset Jazz on the square. But as St Lucia Jazz metamorphosizes into these and new events there is a tide which might suggest that the sun might just set on St Lucia Jazz this year, which is now in its 17th year.

There are a number of persons close to the festival who tell us that this might be the last year and that the minister of Tourism Senator Allen Chastanet may shift the focus to other events including "The Food and Rum Festival" and "Carnival." Last year the St Lucia Jazz was faced with a scaled back budget and was also affected by the rising cost of regional travel, which affected the volume of Caribbean visitors for the event. Some tourism insiders feel that the high cost of regional travel coupled with limited capacity will again affect the numbers.

There were also indications last year from the Minister of Tourism Senator Allen Chastanet, that the festival should become wholly St Lucian as far as the production is concerned. From inception the St Lucia Jazz festival has been organized by Paxton Baker, first through PKB arts and entertainment now through BET productions. This year the arrangement has remained the same but the minister of tourism recently indicated that this is constantly under review and so to is the festival.

Said the Minister at a recent press conference; "We are constantly re-examining the festival and at the end of the day the amount of money we put into it we want to be comforted that we are getting a return. I think that long ago it was easy to justify the level of investment based on the amount of TV exposure that we had. Then I don’t think that the amount of money we are spending, that the TV exposure we are currently getting, that there is compatibility there. So the next question is the number of people. The former group that was here sold you guys, I think the number that was quoted was 15,000 people, to St Lucia Jazz."

By Chastanet’s account there were 15,000 tickets sold to Jazz, not unique individuals and not just to visitors. "I would say to you the number of people coming to St Lucia for the Jazz festival is somewhere between 2,500 and 3,500 people," he said without quoting a source for his figures. However this week the Star was informed by the SLTB that visitors to St Lucia specifically for Jazz last year according to their official survey numbered 5,021.

"So when you look at the number of rooms and the number of tickets we sell that is a realistic number." The minister questioned whether the TV exposure and tickets sold and also the "carry over" was it is worth the money spent on the event. "And that if we spend that money somewhere else that we would not get a better return. So I would tell you that there is constant hard analysis going on about all the events that we are doing and just because something is being run for 17 years doesn’t mean that it has to continue," he said.

The 2008 St Lucia Jazz Festival starts today Saturday May 3rd with the first series of concerts down for Fond d’Or Heritage Park. The event will feature The Royal St Lucia Police band, Boo Hinkson and Friends, Danny Engoba, Diamond Steel and Les Coeurs Brisees. In years gone by, the first event for the festival was an opening Carnival party at Mindoo Phillip Park. However, this event which had grown in popularity was aborted this year drawing much public debate and Fond d’or is now being named "the official opening of Jazz."

From the opening at Fond d’or to the final event on Sunday May 11 at Pigeon Island the 2008 St Lucia Jazz will feature more than a dozen events to be held across the island. These include Jazz In the South on Sunday May 4th, Jazz on the Brach, Sunday May 4, Tea Time Jazz Monday May 5th to Thursday May 8th, Jazz on the Square May 5-9, Soufriere Jazz May 1-3, Kingdom night a Gospel event which debut last year,

Jazz on the Green, Jazz on the Pier and the main event at Pigeon Island May 8-11. The main-stage concerts will feature acts like Dianne Reeves, Michael Bolton, Air Supply, Jonathan Butler and Anita Baker. Luther Francois, Wyclef Jean, Angie Stone and Dionne Warwick will bring the curtains down on the festival, Sunday May 11th. After that it will be back to the drawing board with the biggest question on the table, "will St Lucia host another Jazz festival?