The 21 year partnership between Standard Bank and Joy of Jazz and what this means for the continent

Over the last 21 years, Standard Bank has continued to strengthen its partnership with the Joy of Jazz festival in various ways. Their motive has always been to create a holistic way of working. In return, the Joy of Jazz festival has expanded tremendously since inception 22 years ago.

Founder of the festival, Peter Tladi says he approaches it as a relationship that will last, “There have been many developments over the years. You know when a sponsor starts, they want to see that the horse that they are getting is a real horse. And when they see that this horse runs, then they increase the food to make sure it’s okay. So that’s what Standard Bank has been doing, to make sure the show runs okay. And we’ve been going for so many years.”

This financial support has allowed Tladi to carry out the vision they had for the festival, taking place annually in Johannesburg. “We started as an independent and we were just lucky that we had Standard Bank joining us and seeing the potential in that.” This platform has become increasingly important at a time when many jazz venues in South Africa have closed down.

In other ways, the support for jazz has filtered through the rest of the continent. Over the last few years, there have been exchanges in terms of training and performances formed with different countries across Africa. “If you look at our line-up previously and even this year, you’ll see there’s more African groups coming to the festival from all over,” Tladi says.

“In Africa, Standard Bank has branches in many countries. One of the things we’ve done is to make sure we invite people from those countries to come to the shows. In exchange, we go up to those countries to help train them to be able to set up festivals, whether it’s jazz or not. That’s one of the advantages of having a relationship with them in your country. We also attend conferences for promoters, we meet and get to help each other.”
He continues, “With some of the festivals across Africa, the agreement is we are able to take some of the local acts from here to festivals across the continent. And those other festivals will bring their acts to SA. You bring your artists and I bring mine. It’s an exchange of ideas and talent.”
In addition to that, the funding has helped the festival reach further to the rest of the world and have artists from all over join for collaborations. A good example of this for this year’s line up, is local saxophonist Sisonke Xonti who will be joined by Indonesian pianist Dwiki Dharmawan on Saturday.

The various platforms that Standard Bank supports provides an ongoing movement for young musicians to work with the festival. Artists find their way from performing in youth big bands at the Standard Bank Youth Jazz Festival in Makhanda (Grahamstown) annually. Some have gone on to become Young Artist Award Winners. These same artists choose to perform various projects at the Joy of Jazz festival including an All Star Jazz Band showcase. It has proven to be a mutually beneficial relationship over two decades.

Desiree Pooe, Executive Head of Standard Bank Sponsorship says, “I am amazed at the journey that T-Musicman and Standard Bank have travelled over the years. They go far back and they are both now adults. What started as a small jazz event has grown into a global platform for most of our artists and a launch pad for various careers,”.

She explains further about this connection, “In the case of our portfolio it became easy to make the connection between the jazz program at the National Arts Festival and what is now the largest global platform in South Africa which is the Joy of Jazz. There is a sequence of events and activities that are intentional in creating a talent pipeline to feed the creative industry, purely from a jazz perspective.” 

Speaking about the ongoing partnership, Pooe comments, “It used to be just one part of a much larger jazz portfolio which comprised of many events nationally. With the evolution of strategies and the need to streamline, we needed to reduce the number of sponsorship of events. We could no longer ignore the fact that our responsibility is beyond a contributor to the economy as far as jazz events are concerned, it also considered the broader arts landscape.”

In commenting about the Africa connection, Pooe mentions the importance of strengthening ties between countries musically. “We have 12 regions across Africa that have either a jazz event or an interest in jazz, so that helps to facilitate the cultural exchange.”

Finally, on the importance of the 21 year partnership, Pooe says: “It’s important because arts and culture are one of our strategic pillars for sponsorship. Consistent with our brand position, we seek sponsorship efforts that are the best is their field. We stay invested in the Joy of Jazz because it has consistently achieved that position and evolves organically to retain that position. It also ensures the talent pipeline which continues.”