I love Jazz at Lincoln Center’s yearly Essentially Ellington competition and festival for high school jazz bands. Many may read “high school” in that last sentence and lose interest. I have been to many of the 23 events, and will attest that there is more musicianship from these kids than I have heard from professional musicians in some bars across the country and overseas. (Indeed one Hungarian professional played so poorly he drove me from a bar, but that’s another story.) These are not average high school bands. They are a combination of exceptionally talented and dedicated students and band directors. To get to the three-day event in New York they, along with over 5,300 other bands, must compete in a vigorous yearlong program of mentoring, monitoring, competitions and judging. That willowing removes the chaff. This year we couldn’t experience it there, but Jazz at Lincoln Center posted it live via Livestream, so we watched the final concert and award ceremony at home. When the announcer said that the first to play of the three top prize winners would be the Newark Academy big band from Livingston New Jersey, I resolved to enjoy the show and contact Julius Tolentino, the band’s director, and Erica von Kleist, one of the judges, to talk about the event later.

Julius wears many hats. He is a father, husband, gigging musician, music teacher, and band director at the prestigious Newark Academy. He is also a veteran of Essentially Ellington, having taken various bands there over the years. Last year his band, known as Chameleon, had just missed landing in the top three. He resolved to build on that. “I asked the kids to raise their hands according to how many years they have been in the jazz program. My lead alto, Charles Pan and lead trombone player Reid Christmann have been involved with all of our groups, and studying with me since sixth grade. We have 11 seniors and I was adding up all the years on the board saying, ‘This is why it is going to be a special year, this group has experience.’ Actually, most of the kids had already been to Essentially Ellington, some several times.”

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Resident Jacob Magiera has said it time and again, almost like a mantra – “There’s talent in Roselle Park.”

Resident, saxophonist, professional musician, educator, bandleader, and recording artist Julius Tolentino is the latest example of that.

He dreams of having a jazz festival in the borough and at the end of the November 1st Mayor & Council meeting, he laid out the framework to make his dream a reality before the governing body.

“Seeing all the things that we’re doing in the town I just thought it would be a great place to start off our own jazz festival,” Julius said during his presentation, “Jazz music has the ability to bring communities together. I’ve seen that firsthand. I’ve been fortunate to play a lot of festivals all around the world, and I feel like we can bring something to Roselle Park that will be very different in a jazz festival and really bring in the education part of it and get different towns to come . . . [We’d be] talking about community, talking about the pride of Roselle Park and bringing all these jazz fans to our town would be an amazing endeavor.”

Julius took part in the 2015 Roselle Park Loves Art Festival with the Chameleon Jazz Band. It was that performance that made him realize the possibility that Roselle Park could be a home for jazz music.

In reviewing on the record his outline for a 2019 Roselle Park Jazz Festival, Julius – who has taken part in the Montclair Jazz Festival – pulled from his 20 years as a professional musician and 12 years in music education in order to formulate a program that would incorporate a program he has started in New Providence as part of the New Jersey Youth Symphony. It is a two-week workshop and Julius would love to see that two-week workshop culminate in a big jazz festival.

He also wants to include the swing dance community in Jersey to make it a full immersion event. He explained, “There’s a big swing dance community and we have ties the George Gee Big Band as well as a vocal competition that will also bring different communities together. That would be like an online vocal competition, and the two finalists will perform with the student big band at the festival.”

Julius has a tentative date, July 27th, in mind. He sees the gazebo area of Michael Mauri Park on the corner of East Grant Avenue and Chestnut Street as a great location for the festival. If possible, he would like to include a sound stage much like the ones that have been used for the music portion of the Roselle Park Arts Festival. The inaugural year would have two main acts and a dance lesson portion.

“I think it’s all feasible with the team that we have,” he stated, adding, “I’m also bringing in Lori Wood Montague. She’s very experienced with running a festival. She’s a key component to the Montclair Jazz Festival being what it is. She worked for Jazz House Kids for many years, and she’s also a wonderful fundraiser that would help bring in the funds to pull this thing off.”

Councilman-At-Large Joseph DeIorio, during the presentation, addressed the municipal government aspects and logistics for the jazz festival. He explained that an autonomous entity could be created which would be separate from the municipality but still have the support of the municipality to have Roselle Park be the host and cover insurance, safety, and public works.

One main component in Julius’ big picture outlook is to not just have the jazz festival but to provide several scholarships to Roselle Park’s finest musicians from middle school to high school and have them attend the summer camp for two weeks then have them featured on the big stage.

With no objection from the dais, the next step for Julius is to meet with the borough’s municipal arts committee this month to begin the actual work of scheduling and setting target dates to have the 2019 Roselle Park Arts Festival become a reality.