Jazz is at the very heart of the City of Denton, and one thing that helps keep it beating is the annual Denton Arts & Jazz Festival.

elebrating its 27th year, the Arts & Jazz Festival is easily the town’s biggest shindig, bringing 2,200 musicians, artists, and performers to an audience of more than 200,000.

Since its early days as a humble gathering called Spring Fling, the draw has always been the music, and that hasn’t changed. This year’s headliners include local favorites Brave Combo and blues vocalist Susan Tedeschi, who will play on the Wells Fargo/Budweiser Jazz Stage this weekend.

Kid Stuff
As it’s evolved, the festival has expanded its reach into the arts with a wide assortment of crafts and activities, not to mention an entire zone for kids.

“Every year we add more things for families and children,” says Dena Bruton-Claus, president of the Denton Festival Foundation Inc., which produces the festival. “Now there are multiple stages for children’s acts, roving children’s entertainers, and the children’s art tent.”

Here’s an event where you can both buy original art and let your kids create their own. Snack on a steak-and-potato wrap, crunchy kettle corn, and funky Frito pie from one of the more than 50 food vendors, or just sit back and listen to the music. Best of all, admission and entertainment is free.

Secret Weapon
The festival’s secret weapon is its cadre of volunteers, which total nearly 1,000. More than half of the volunteers are provided by sponsors. Nearly 400 are affiliated with the foundation. Festival founder Carol Short dubbed them “Top Hands” in the early days of the festival.

“Honestly, we couldn’t do it without volunteers,” Bruton-Claus says. She first volunteered for the festival back in her college days.

“The question is not who volunteers, but who doesn’t,” says Janette Hayward, a board member and Top Hand herself. Area business leaders, professors at the University of North Texas, and local politicians all lend a hand. Could there be any better thrill than having Mayor Perry McNeill or former mayor Euline Brock fetch you a turkey leg?

“We have the same people who come back year after year and get their friends to come, too,” Hayward says. “People from the community, college students, and some businesses provide volunteers. It’s a huge undertaking that keeps getting bigger.”

The foundation also lines up sponsors, both corporate and individual, from Wells Fargo Bank to Target stores to generous small businesses like Sleeping Lizzards. It adds up to approximately $200,000 in financial support to Civic Center Park and other local arts beneficiaries.

Being a Top Hand volunteer costs $15, but that gets you a reserved parking space for the day you work, plus food and drink coupons, and the excitement of having your name in the paper. In exchange, you work a three- or four-hour shift.

The Music
Volunteers get to sample the goods. More than 150 performances on six stages are spread across the festival’s 20-acre grounds at Denton Civic Center Park.

Among the biggest attractions are musicians from the University of North Texas, including the renowned Lab Bands, as well as the UNT Jazz Singers and the UNT Guitar Ensemble—all of whom perform back to back Saturday, April 28, on the Celebration Stage.

Another favorite is the roving musicians, who begin their performances on the Roving River Stage, then wander over to the North Park where they play an acoustic set.

The Art
Children have fun, too. Choose from face painting, rock climbing, inflatable games, and taking a spin on the “kiddie” ferris wheel—sorry, adults not allowed. Budding artists hit the Art Tent, where art teacher Jane Ruestmann lays out the tools for a dozen media, including drawing, painting, and printmaking.

You could devote an entire day to trolling the art, with more than 170 artists’ booths showing watercolors, jewelry, stained glass, and sculpture.

This year’s featured artist is J. Lynn Kelly, whose portrait of Brave Combo was chosen as the logo for this year’s T-shirts and brochures (above). Kelly, who lives in Hurst, showed his paintings at Denton for the first time last year.

“The response from the crowd was so good,” he recalls. “I even met a gallery owner who started to show my stuff. But the thing I love is when people walk by and, when they see the art, they stop in their tracks. What a feeling that is.”