As Jazz in the South prepares to host its 15th edition from 30 April to 3 May 2011 in Laborie and Vieux Fort, one can remember that it is thanks to SLASPA, and to the vision of its then Director Desmond Skeete, that this component of the Saint Lucia Jazz Festival was started. It was in May 1997, and Labowi Promotions (an organisation that was created in 1991) had been in discussions with the Tourist Board for a couple of years to see how the Festival could be decentralised and reach more people in the south of the island. In response to this, the Tourist Board, with financial support from SLASPA, offered the group Pan Explosion, with a memorable performance that brought together four great panmen (Andy Narell, Ray Holman, Robbie Greenidge and Gregory ‘Shining’ Emmanuel). Since 1997, SLASPA’s support to Jazz in the South has been consistent and unswerving.

This year, Andy Narell returns to Laborie and Vieux Fort as the Patron of Jazz in the South, having performed on four occasions (including the very first year) at Saint Lucia’s Festival over the past two decades. On Sunday 1 May, he will perform the amazing University of Calypso project that he has created with legendary calypsonian Relator, and he will also continue the work that he started with the Laborie Pan Project during a three‐week stay in Laborie in February this year.

Since 1997, Jazz in the South has featured over 120 bands and musicians from all over the Caribbean, including Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, and Trinidad and Tobago, and it has established itself as a significant component of the Saint Lucia Jazz Festival, with a distinct identity that usefully complements the other components of the Festival. Caribbean artists featured in past editions of Jazz in the South include many of the greatest names in Caribbean Jazz.

For this 15th edition of the Festival, the focus of Jazz in the South will remain on the Caribbean, with two guest performers from Africa. The venues for the events will be Coconut Bay Resort and Spa in Vieux Fort (30 April and 1 May) and the Rudy John Beach Park in Laborie (2 May). In addition, there will be workshops and master classes taking place in the South of the island on Tuesday 3 May.

Jazz in the South is organised by Labowi Promotions, a community‐based organisation established two decades ago by a small group of people from the village of Laborie, in the south of Saint Lucia. Its aim is to support cultural production and to promote development through arts and culture, by organising quality performances, promoting linkages between events and business opportunities, and improving the skills and visibility of local artists. SLASPA is proud to be associated with these efforts.