February 15, 2006

Published in Wake Forest, NC

            The jazz festival is a cooperative event between the center and the Wake Forest Cultural Arts Association.

            Jim Wallace, the cultural arts chairman, said the planning committee met early this week and, despite concern about events at the center, plan to go forward with the money raised to be split with the center.

            “The goal of renovating the buildings (on the 17-acre campus) is still a valuable one for the town and the community,” Wallace said.

            Although the event is a highlight of spring in the area, it does not raise a lot of money, Wallace said. In the first couple years, cultural arts underwrote the event and took the small losses. “We budget the event so if we sell three hundred tickets – which we’ve never done – we will break even.”

            Last year, with the help of sponsorships by attorney John Rich and others there was enough of a profit so that each group received about $1,000. “Bettie used it for her programs, and we used it for ours,” Wallace said.

            The program this year will be the same as last, with music provided by vocalist Lois DeLoatch and the Ed Paolantonio Quintet. Ed Paolantonio is the leader and pianist with John Brown of bass, Thomas Taylor on drums, Ira Wiggins on saxophone and Jim Ketch on trumpet. The musicians hold jazz workshops for students from area middle and high schools in the afternoon, and the first song after intermission features some of those students.

            The evening begins at 7 p.m. with dinner followed by the concert and dance until 11 p.m. There will be a silent auction and the cakewalk.

            The $25 tickets will be available for sale soon.

            Pelosi also plans to go forward with the art auction on March 4 beginning at 6:30 p.m. but all of the funds raised and donated will go to Bettie Murchison’s W.E.B. DuBois Community Development Corporation, which plans to continue and expand the School of the Arts.