The jazz is back in Healdsburg

Next week, the 13th annual salute to true jazz opens its 10-day run at venues scattered around Healdsburg, drawing top jazz players from all over the country, most of them performing free as a favor to Felix.

But last summer, it looked like the festival might be dead forever. In July, the festival board canceled this year's event, citing the chronic debt as the reason, and laid off Felix by eliminating her position.

After a five-week outpouring of protests from supporters and professional musicians, the board reinstated Felix and resigned en masse. That left the jazz maven, as tough and determined as ever, free to recruit a new board and start raising money.

“People often say no one is indispensable, but Jessica is one person who definitely is indispensable for the health and well-being of Healdsburg and jazz,” said Gloria Hersch, new president of the Healdsburg Jazz Festival board and a longtime supporter of the event.

“Jessica has a strong personality, and she is sometimes less than fully diplomatic,” Hersch said. “But she has not only a passion for jazz, but also a deep respect for the art form and the artists.”

Even though the festival raised enough money to pay off its debts last December, the organization still faces a steep fundraising climb.

“The musicians are coming here to build for the future,” Felix said.

Playing jazz professionally can be a difficult way to earn a living, especially on the club and festival circuit, so why are established musicians willing to cross the country to play for no fee in Healdsburg?

New York jazz pianist George Cables, one of the headliners at this year's festival, says the reasons are loyalty to Felix and respect for her devotion.

“Jessica really loves this music,” Cables said. “This is her heartbeat. Over the years, she has laid her energies on the line. She has really fought for the music and the festival.”

Felix, 62, is a jazz purist who has been listening to the music for at least four decades. And for almost that long, she has been helping the musicians find places to play.

She met Cables, and many of her jazz favorites, at the Keystone Korner nightclub in San Francisco's North Beach, first as a fan and later as a talent booker for roughly a decade, starting in the late '70s. Felix went on to produce other concerts, including benefit events to help her musician friends and their families cover major medical expenses.

“She did a fundraiser for me when I had a kidney and liver transplant, and I wasn't able to do anything for six months,” Cables said.

So when Felix asked musicians to help keep the Healdsburg Jazz Festival alive, it's no surprise they said yes.

“In a lot of ways, I'm calling in the markers,” Felix said. “This is the time that I needed the help. I've built up something that I really believe in here.”

But she didn't have to pressure the musicians to come.

“We know where Jessica's coming from,” Cables said. “There are a lot of musicians who are grateful to Jessica for her efforts to promote the music.”

Saxophonist and composer Charles Lloyd, an international jazz star who lives in Santa Barbara and a Healdsburg headliner again this year, sees the festival as a crusade for jazz.

“It's a beautiful thing when people near and far can recognize integrity and quality, and stand up to fight for it,” Lloyd said. “If we are not willing to give back to someone who has put so much on the line for us over the years, what hope would there be for humanity? So during this year's festival, the music is a gift to Jessica.”

With the exception of a year at college in Tempe, Ariz., Felix has lived her whole life in California. She was born and raised in Los Angeles and had a long stay in the Bay Area. She attended Santa Rosa Junior College and Sonoma State University, where she received a bachelor's degree in sociology in 1971.

Felix settled in Healdsburg in 1994, and seven months later staged her first jazz show, a George Cables concert at the Flying Goat Coffeehouse. In 1999, she launched the Healdsburg Jazz Festival, with jazz stars Cedar Walton, Billy Higgins, Bobby Hutcherson and others.

The festival, which draws 5,000 fans a year, needs $300,000 to cover this year's production, promotion and other costs, including some food, lodging and travel expenses for the musicians. And to make sure there's a festival next year, Felix wants to come out $50,000 ahead.

“It's not enough to break even,” she said.

In April, Felix closed her Art and All That Jazz shop after 16 years in downtown Healdsburg, where she created and sold sculpture-like jewelry. She still maintains a studio in town, which she opens to the public by appointment.

Never married, with no children, Felix has had several relationships, but she remains totally devoted to jazz and the Healdsburg Jazz Festival.

Her disdain for pop-influenced “smooth jazz” is well-known, but she still has a hard time defining the real thing.

“I know what jazz is when I hear it, and I really know what it isn't,” she said. “With jazz, you have to feel it. You have to let it into your soul and experience it. If you do, you will understand the music. I feel really good that I've brought so many people so much music that they've learned to love.”

You can reach Staff Writer Dan Taylor at 521-5243 or dan.taylor@pressdemocrat.com. See his ARTS blog at http://arts.blogs.pressdemocrat.com.