Ellis Marsalis the headline act --- or at least the first among greats --- at the 2010 Panama Jazz Festival

You can call the patriarch of the musical Marsalis tribe, pianist Ellis Marsalis, the headline act at the 2010 Panama Jazz Festival and it would be true enough. However, it's the exceptional festival where the band or musician with top billing isn't shown up by someone else, quite frequently by some relative unknown.

Granted, this past one was an exception to the trend. Nobody outdid the Wayne Shorter Quartet --- except arguably, Cuban pianist Chucho Valdés and his band, or maybe the performers at the flamenco jazz gala at the Teatro Nacional --- but only arguably. The conventional wisdom is that Shorter blew everyone into another dimension and that's how this reporter heard it.

This year we'll have a few of last year's performers back --- Danilo Pérez, of course, and sometimes bandmate and bassman extraordinaire John Patitucci, who's also almost a regular at these things, plus the outstanding young flamenco guitarist Juanito Pascual.

Then, also at or near the top of the bill is veteran jazz singer Dee Dee Bridgewater:

This coming edition of the Panama Jazz Festival is dedicated to the late Panamanian pianist Sonny White (1917-1971), whose parents gave him the name Ellerton Oswald and who is best known for accompanying Billie Holiday on the classic anti-lynching protest song "Strange Fruit." In addition to pianist Danilo Pérez, the Panamanian contingent in this year's festival will be led by saxman Carlos Garnett. Drummer/percussionist Jamie Haddad is among the other international stars who will grace the stage.

As always, the greater part of the festival's mission will be educational. Five institutions --- the Berklee College of Music, the New England Conservatory, the Conservatorio de Musica de Puerto Rico, the Golandsky Institute and the Danilo Perez Foundation --- will be conducting workshops not only in jazz, but also in dance, classical music, sound and recording and other skills related to the music business. These educational institutions will be holding auditions for possible new students, and some of them will be awarding scholarships to the best new prospects. Berklee will use the festival to launch an ambitious new effort, the Global Jazz Institute, of which Pérez will be the director and Patitucci, Lovano and Carrington will be among the faculty members.

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