Williamstown International Jazz Festival: Winter Series, 5-6 June, 2026
By Des Cowley
Anyone who has seen Bert Stern’s classic film about the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival will recall its hypnotic opening credits. Set to the music of Jimmy Giuffre’s ‘The Train and the River’, the camera idles across Newport Harbor, zeroing in on dappled sunlight as it creates abstract patterns on the water, just like one of those David Hockney paintings of swimming pools. But it’s not just Newport that connects jazz with water. Think of the Antibes Jazz Festival, founded in 1960, and performed on a stage set before the calm, blue Mediterranean waters of the French Riviera. Or the Montreux Jazz Festival, overlooking the shores of Lake Geneva.
The Melbourne suburb of Williamstown is a long way from those places, but it too has adopted the concept of coupling jazz with water via its ‘jazz by the bay’ initiative. The 2026 inaugural Williamstown International Jazz Festival is, admittedly, a far more modest affair than its Rhode Island counterpart, with just three concerts programmed across the weekend of 5-6 June. But for this small, tight-knit bayside community, it’s an important initiative.
Festival Director, Bolivian-born pianist Danilo Rojas, concedes there were several motivating factors behind the push for a local jazz festival: “I felt that Williamstown needed a stronger cultural and musical presence, especially after the closure of its local jazz club. This feeling became stronger after the vandalism that damaged the grand piano and equipment at The Uniting Trinity Church, where our community concerts take place. That moment reinforced my belief that music needed to be reactivated here as a positive cultural and educational force.”
If you plotted jazz venues on a map of Melbourne, you’d soon see that they increasingly cluster around where musicians choose (or can afford) to live and work: Brunswick, Northcote, Thornbury, Footscray. For Rojas, a resident of Williamstown since relocating to Australia in 2014, this sense of fostering community is important: “I have been living in Williamstown, where I founded a music school and became deeply involved in the local community through music and education.” It helps that he’s had prior experience running festivals, having been Artistic Director of Jazzbol, in Bolivia, as well as having collaborated for many years with the Bolivia International Jazz Festival.
The 2026 Winter program reflects Rojas’s belief in forging “identity, authenticity, and diversity, presented through high-level concerts in an intimate community setting at the Uniting Church in Williamstown.” The Friday night concert is a case in point: a trio uniting the talents of Dutch pianist Mike del Ferro, Cuban (but New York-based) bassist Yunior Terry, and Australian drummer (and Director of Panorama Brasil) Al Kerr. For Rojas, this sort of blending of distinct musical traditions “is about creating a space where musicians can listen to each other, interact, and build something new in real time. It requires artistic excellence, but also openness, generosity, and human connection. In this sense, improvisation — or jazz — reflects the present moment: a unique experience that cannot be repeated in the same way.”
The opening Saturday night performance, at first glance, seems something of a curveball. Trio Tripudiis Sonis Variis – saxophonist Mirko Guerini, vocalist Ilaria Crociani, and guitarist Steve Magnusson – aim to re-imagine acclaimed arias by Claudio Monteverdi, Alessandro Scarlatti, Barbara Strozzi, and others. With an eclectic array of instruments – piano, duduk, Chinese flute, chalumeau (an early Baroque woodwind instrument), dulcimer, harmonium, guitar – this outstanding trio are sure to put their own improvisatory stamp on this music. For Rojas, the trio represents “very distinct artistic worlds, but they share a deep commitment to creativity, authenticity, and musical communication.”
The final concert of the Festival features Danilo Rojas’s own trio, comprising Argentinian bassist Pablo Guzzo, and percussionist Salvador Persico. For this performance, Rojas has augmented the trio with Turkish guitarist Onur Puza – who relocated to Melbourne in 2018 – furthering his mission to highlight cross-cultural musical dialogues. Rojas cites this as an artistic exchange “where I invite him to explore Latin American musical traditions in improvisation, while also engaging with his own ‘Turkish’ contemporary jazz language.”
When I broach his own musical influences, Rojas is quick to acknowledge his own musical hero: “My father, Gilberto Rojas, who was also my first piano teacher. He is a major figure in Bolivian popular music and has had a deep influence on my musical identity from the very beginning.” Besides his father, he points to musicians he’s worked with, like Luis Salinas in Argentina, and Hugo Fattoruso in Uruguay, as well as an illustrious lineage of jazz pianists: Wynton Kelly, Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, McCoy Tyner, Keith Jarrett, Brad Mehldau, and Michel Petrucciani.
Rojas sees this Winter program as a first step. He’s already planning a Spring series at the beginning of October, and eventually hopes the main Festival can take place in February, with the support of the Council and the local community. “We are also hoping to introduce local community jam sessions starting in springtime, helping to create a stronger jazz culture and connection within Williamstown and Melbourne’s west.”
For Rojas, the Williamstown International Jazz Festival is about creating unique musical encounters. At the same time, it’s about placing “music at the heart of the community, not only as performance but also as education, connection, and cultural exchange.” For now, it’s run as an independent, non-profit, community-based venture, drawing on volunteer support. Where does Rojas see the festival in ten years: “My hope for the festival is that it grows in a sustainable way, closely connected to the community of Williamstown and the broader Melbourne music scene, without competing with other festivals but complementing them. Ultimately, I want the festival to remain artistically strong, community-based, and open, allowing both established and emerging musicians to grow within it.”
Williamstown International Jazz Festival takes place the weekend of 5-6 June at the Uniting Church, 36 Electra St, Williamstown: https://www.williamstownjazz.com/