Organised by the resurgent Glasgow Jazz Festival, which this year reported a 90% increase in attendances for concerts at its flagship Old Fruitmarket venue over 2008 figures, and the London-based agency that acts as a voice for the music, Jazz Services, a series of showcase concerts will complement what is essentially a weekend business meeting of jazz promoters and festival organisers.
These are not just any jazz promoters and festival organisers. The 66 EJN members from 22 countries represent the leading jazz events and venues across Europe. Bands playing at these showcases, which are open to the public, will have the chance to make an impression that could lead to appearances at high profile festivals in Copenhagen, Clusone (Italy), and Le Mans (France), as well as at London Jazz Festival.
One Scottish band is already booked for Vilnius Jazz Festival in Lithuania after an EJN "advance party" attended Glasgow Jazz Festival's Homegrown concert series last month.
"It's a huge opportunity to make an impact on a scale that's just not possible elsewhere," says EJN chairman Nod Knowles, the former Scottish Arts Council music director who is now chief executive at Bath International Music Festival. "The delegates will be in Glasgow primarily to network and discuss possibilities of working together on projects, but they will also be looking for distinctive music of the highest quality to programme and the aim would be for Glasgow to host."
A total of 14 bands drawn from all over the UK and including top singer Liane Carroll, the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, pianist Tom Cawley's Curios and the latest instalment of the Jazz Warriors - a further six or seven Scottish bands are expected to be added - will appear at showcases in the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall's Strathclyde Suite and the Old Fruitmarket.
Knowles, who knows the Scottish scene well from his time at the SAC, attended Homegrown this year and believes Scotland has a depth of jazz talent that could be exported. He says: "Tommy Smith's work, both with his Youth Orchestra and the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra, stands out as an example that could do really well in Europe.
"But at Homegrown there were others such as Colin Steele's quintet, Stu Brown's Raymond Scott Project and Ryan Quigley's group that showed how exciting Scottish jazz is at the moment. It's like Scotland has become to jazz what Scandinavian countries were in the 1970s - and have been again in recent times - and if that is the case, this is the time to prove it."
The Europe Jazz Network's origins go back to 1987, when a group of producers, presenters and supporting organisations specialising in contemporary jazz and improvised music got together informally to share information on touring musicians and ideas for working together. With the arrival of the internet and the merging of the original group with the Techno group of festival promoters in 2000, the organisation became more sophisticated and applications to the EU for funding resulted in projects such as the Europe Jazz Odyssey, and tours and collaborations happening across the continent.
In its report of its 2008 general assembly, held in Copenhagen, EJN states that it exists to support the identity and diversity of jazz in Europe and broaden awareness of the music as a cultural and educational force.
For Jill Rodger, director of Glasgow Jazz Festival, joining the EJN puts the festival "back among the big boys" and she sees the event being taken seriously again after five or six years spent working with limited resources.
"Being invited to join is kudos to the festival," she says, "and for Glasgow to be chosen as the venue for the general assembly says a lot, not just about the jazz festival but about the Scottish jazz scene and Glasgow itself. Being a Unesco City of Music helped bring the assembly here, but I'd like to see this being more than a one-off event. A weekend of European jazz every other year in September would be a suitable lasting legacy and that's hopefully what we'll be working towards."
Before that, however, there are spaces for Scottish musicians to be filled in this year's showcase concerts and as Nod Knowles says, they shouldn't be shy about applying. He says: "The bands chosen from the rest of the UK represent the benchmark in terms of quality and I have every faith the Scottish contingent can step up to that, "I wouldn't claim to have any influence on my EJN colleagues, but a programme of Scottish jazz in Le Mans or Bruges, say, resulting from these showcases? It's not impossible."
