Finger snaps and toe taps fill Cambridge hall during inaugural jazz festival

Music poured out from Tapestry Hall in downtown Cambridge Sunday afternoon, as Galt Jazz held the city’s first-ever jazz festival.

Music poured out of Tapestry Hall in downtown Cambridge Sunday afternoon, as Galt Jazz held the city’s first-ever jazz festival.

Galt Jazz was founded by Dave Ottenbrite in the aftermath of the pandemic.

“In January 2022, we decided it was time to do a little something to help our downtown core, give it a little bit more life,” said Ottenbrite. 

After dozens of shows, Ottenbrite and other jazz-lovers’ thirst for the art only grew.

“I think I’ve had a lot of people ask me ‘are you going to do a jazz festival?’” said Ottenbrite. “Because they’re cool, they’re fun… I thought, ‘why not?’”

Attendees were able to watch hours of jazz performances while also choosing to enjoy drinks or something to eat.

Kitchener-Conestoga Member of Parliament Tim Louis was also in attendance, but he wasn’t there to watch.

“I believe I was playing another festival when [Ottenbrite] was in the crowd and said ‘hey, we’re starting up the Cambridge Jazz Festival. Would you like to be part of it?’” said Louis. “And I don’t know if he finished the sentence before I said ‘absolutely.’ That was a while ago, but you know what? The day snuck up, and here we are today and it looks great.”

Louis and his six-piece band was one of multiple performances of the day, which also included Red Hot Ramble, Pretzel Logic and Heather Bambrick.

Charles and Christine Calvert live in Cambridge and are members of the Kitchener-Waterloo Dixieland Jazz Club. As fans of one of the performers, they came to the show to watch.

“I was so excited about this because we’ve been waiting for this in Cambridge,” said Christine. “Now we found out today that there’s more in the city, so now we have more opportunities for music enjoyment.”

In terms of making the festival an annual event, Ottenbrite says it’s a tentative plan.

“We decided to have a little fun and see how everything turns out at the end of,” he said. “It takes a tremendous amount of work. It also takes a tremendous amount of money and we are community funded. We have no sponsors, which is very unusual for a jazz festival, but we got it done.”

Ottenbrite said anyone willing to help out or wanting to volunteer can visit their website.

Despite a full hall and a successful festival, Ottenbrite was surprised by the energy.

“The funny thing is people thanked me all the time, but I guess that still baffles me,” he said. “They congratulate me and I’m just having fun. I’ve always liked to throw parties, so if anybody wants to join in, come on out.”