On August 31 in Miltiņi the first “CRAFT and JAZZ” festival will take place

Rounding up this year's line of summer jazz festivals in Latvia, on August 31 in Miltiņi, Bērzes parish, Dobele district, in the former culture house “Zelta Druva” the first “CRAFT and JAZZ” festival will take place. The event will consist of two parts: trade fair and workshops with Baltic craft producers taking part will be continued with various evening jazz concerts and a disco in the large hall of the historical culture house.

“Sustainability means transforming old into new and functional. “Dvoretsky distillery” bought the culture house “Zelta Druva” to transform it into a new level distillery of a high-quality Latvian product. We decided: before we begin renovation works, we'll invite everyone to celebrate”, – says the organizer of the festival, entrepreneur Ivans Dvoreckis.

Since the festival will take place on the former culture house premises and territory, the topic uniting this year's celebration is “Time Machine” – in the 80's, when the culture house was active and vivid, people had to try hard to use their imagination in this region in order to create and produce new products and services, meanwhile jazz all around the globe in the eighties continued to bloom – groove, smooth jazz, funk and fusion won the hearts of the audience and ruled over the dancefloors all around. The festival visitors are invited to choose the dress code of the 80's on the festival day.

In the first part of the festival, from 13:00 to 18:00 the craft trade fair will take place along with the drink tastings, lotteries and contests; guests will be offered home kitchen treats, while kids will enjoy various attractions and cotton candy. In the foyer of the culture house gin distillation workshops will take place, meanwhile the festival guests will learn or refresh knowledge of the analog photography art at the pop-up photo laboratory by the “Baltic Analog Lab”. 

In the second part of the festival from 18:00 and onwards the stage of the former culture house will accommodate Riga Dome Choir School's jazz ensemble “Harmonijas Hameleoni”, avant-garde jazz band “Avangarda Vangards”, Ralfs Arbidāns jazz trio, and as a culmination – sunny program “Golden Hour” by the singer Julija Zakirova. After a bunch of concerts hosted by the musical journalist Anete Ašmane-Vilsone, the festival visitors can dance to jazz, funk, disco and groove rhythms played by DJ VinK and Mixmaster AG from the vinyls.