Winterfest Entertainment : Garfield Jazz Band

Garfield High School is a public high school in Seattle, WA, with students from a variety of cultural and economic backgrounds. Garfield’s jazz culture is so strong that it maintains multiple levels of jazz bands in its curriculum for over 75 students. Garfield continues to bring to young people the jazz traditions of such big bands as Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Woody Herman. Garfield is a frequent participant in the Essentially Ellington National Jazz Band Competition and Festival at Lincoln Center in New York City. Since 1999, Garfield has been selected as one of the 15 Essentially Ellington finalists twelve times, including an unprecedented four first-place trophies (in 2003, 2004, 2009 and 2010), as well as second place finishes in 2002 and 2008 and third place in 2006. Graduates of the Garfield Jazz program have gone on to study at leading music schools throughout the country, such as the Berklee College of Music, The Juilliard School, Eastman School of Music, Manhattan School of Music, The New England Conservatory of Music, USC Thornton School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory of Music and Cornish College of the Arts.