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2025 marks the 30th anniversary celebration programming starting in September at the Hyde Park Jazz Festival with guest Yamashita Yosuke. Main programming is presented over four days in November at Elastic Arts featuring established and emerging voices that represent the multigenerational landscape; plus a discussion panel our AIRMW space about the history, inception and growth of the festival.
We celebrate the last event of the CAAJF at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago in December with a special Reduction 11 program in conjunction with the Yoko Ono exhibition, reviving music from the SKYLANDING album from Tatsu Aoki's The MIYUMI Project commissioned to celebrate Ono's permanent sculpture in Jackson Park, in 2016.
30th ANNIVERSARYof the
CHICAGO ASIAN AMERICAN JAZZ FESTIVAL
2025 MAIN PROGRAM
November 7-10, 2025
at Elastic Arts (3429 W. Diversey Ave. #208) from 8:30pm
@Elastic Arts
Set 1 (8:30pm) – Francis Wong and Chicago Time Code
Set 2 (9:30pm) – Jeff Chan and Ratchet
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Saturday, November 8
1pm @ AIRMW (4875 N. Elston Ave) – CAAJF Panel Discussion
8:30pm @ Elastic Arts
Set 1 (8:30pm) – Ester Hana
Set 2 (9:30pm) – Yoko Noge and Jazz Me Blues
Sunday, Nov 9
@ Elastic Arts
Set 1 (7:30pm) – Takashi Shallow
Set 2 (8:30pm) – Chien-an Yuan and All Things Shining
Set 3 (9:30pm) – Kioto Aoki, Haruhi Kobayashi and Mai Sugimoto Trio
Monday, Nov 10
@Elastic Arts
8:30pm – Tatsu Aoki's The MIYUMI Project
Tickets available at the door
$20/ $10 with student ID
CAAJF programming at the Hyde Park Jazz Festival September 2025
Satuday, September 27
• Nikutai Mondo Trio @ 1pm
• Asian American Jazz Fest 30th Anniversay Panel @ 4:30pm
Sunday,September 28
• CHICAGO ASIAN-AMERICAN ENSEMBLE: Origins of Now 2025 @ 3pm
Visit the full Hyde Park Jazz Festival schedule here
CAAJF and TL22 CAAJF is a program of Asian Improv aRts Midwest (AIRMW) and is supported by general operating support received from the Illinois Arts Council Agency; the Richard H. Driehaus Foundation; the Alphawood Foundation, Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events (DCASE), The Field Foundation, the Walder Foundation, the Joyce Foundation and a special project grant from John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
REDUCTION 11
Friday, December 19 @ 7pm
Edlis Neeson Theater at Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago
In tandem with the exhibition Yoko Ono: Music of the Mind, at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Asian Improv aRts Midwest & Tsukasa Taiko is delighted to present Reduction 11, as part of our annual end-of-year concert series.
This year's program features the music of Yoko Ono's SKYLANDING, a project recorded by Tatsu Aoki's The MIYUMI Project in 2016 and a collaboration with Yoko Ono for her sculpture in Jackson Park. The MIYUMI Project plays with Tsukasa Taiko to present this project on the theatrical stage with traditional Japanese music & dance.
*Tickets available November 10*
29th CAAJF in 2024:
November 1 & 2
8:30pm @ Elastic Arts
(3429 W Diversey Ave #208)
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Francis Wong Ensemble
&
Chien-An Yuan + Naomi Columna
AIRMW presents two acts for the first night of the 29th edition of the Chicago Asian American Jazz Festival. The evening opens with Chien-An Yuan and Naomi Columna, followed by
Francis Wong's ensemble with Chicago musicians.
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SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 2
Joy Yang Trio​
(Joy Yang, Mitchell Maftean & Ori Sergel)
Day two of the 29th Chicago Asian American Jazz Festival (CAAJF) presents the Joy Yang Trio at Elastic Arts to celebrate her newest album "LIVE ON" released through Asian Improv Records
​​​November 4
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7pm @ Green Line Performing Arts Center
(329 East Garfield Boulevard)
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Tatsu Aoki's The MIYUMI Project closes out this year's CAAJF at
Arts + Public Life's First Monday Jazz
The MIYUMI Project is a cross-cultural music journey and one of the first Asian-American/African-American collaborative music projects to come out of the Midwest in the late 90s. This project illuminates the drum traditions of Japanese taiko and jazz in a musical approach that incorporates the drummer languages of each genre. Infusing Japanese-influenced aesthetics of accompaniment within the rhythm section, the group carries this concept of time into, through, and underneath the music as an essential and natural thread.
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