OLD TOWN – The Novel Jazz Septet will play at Riverfront Park on July 18 at 6:30 p.m.

Novel Jazz features the music of the iconic Duke Ellington and his equally iconic musical collaborator, Billy Strayhorn. The band is a Maine-based group, now in their 15th year of concerts around Maine and New England; its mission is to share the music and stories of two giants of jazz who wrote some 3000 compositions over their musical careers, two percent of which represents the well-known standards and 98 percent of which most have never heard.

Novel Jazz will perform standard tunes from the Ellington/Strayhorn repertoire plus newly arranged compositions that they have unearthed in the Ellington Archives of the Smithsonian Museum of American History in Washington D.C., some of which have not been heard in decades. The band has rearranged these pieces for the septet, dusted them off and given them a 21st century sound, all of their own.

Bring your blankets and chairs to Riverfront Park at 6:30 p.m. for an evening of great music. Please remember the park  is a tobacco free zone.

In the event of rain, the concert will take place at the Old Town Museum at 353 Main Street.

The 2019 summer concert series is hosted by The Old Town Public Library and sponsored by The City of Old Town, and the generous concert attendees who put their bills and coins in the donation jar each concert night.  Concerts will be held at Riverfront Park in Old Town at 6:30 pm, every Thursday evening through Aug. 15. For a complete list of this year’s performers, visit the library’s website at: http://old-town.lib.me.us.