Especially for the festival, the jazz departments of the Koninklijk Conservatorium Antwerpen, Hochschule für Musik und Tanz Köln and Codarts Rotterdam have put together a big band with students from these three music institutions. This Codarts Antwerp Cologne Big Band is the initial effort of a more intensive collaboration that the three schools started recently. The big band is conducted by Codarts teacher, trombone player and arranger Ilja Reijngoud. For the past twenty years, he has conducted the Codarts Big Band, that has already performed many times at North Sea Jazz. Several pieces by students and teachers involved in this project are on the program of this new, extended student big band. International musical fireworks in the making!
