“I’m just the numbers behind it,” Cicely Mitchell says, humbly referring to her role as the co-founder of The Art of Cool Project. The Durham nonprofit, which promotes jazz-influenced music, is entering its fifth year in addition to hosting its third music festival May 6-8, featuring more than 20 performances over three days. “It’s just a pleasure to be trusted to lead something like this,” she says. Still, she never pictured becoming a driving force in our music scene – she has a Ph.D. in biostatistics and doesn’t play an instrument. “I like music, but all of this chose me. I’m just going with the path that is laid out and trusting that this is what I’m supposed to be doing with my life.” Cicely couldn’t do it alone: Art of Cool co-founder Al Strong acts as the creative, “as a litmus test, making sure we’re sticking where we need to be as far as a jazz nonprofit,” she says. But it’s Cicely who handles the booking, contracts, networking, pitching for sponsorships and assisting in writing grants. Her current focus is on the festival, but she’s also working on a side project, So When Do I Clap?, consulting with venues and presenters on their programming. More on that, plus her festival goals, how you can help and why 2015 was a banner year for jazz:
Now that you’re coming up on your third festival, what has you most pumped this year?
I’m really excited to see The Internet; they are pretty popular on the West Coast, and there’s a lot of West Coast influence on this year’s [Art of Cool] lineup. We always try to put together a nice program that is carefully curated. It may not have a theme, but there’s an underlying commonality among the programing. Some of these people we’re bringing in 2016 (Thundercat, Kamasi Washington) worked with Kendrick Lamar on [his album] “To Pimp a Butterfly,” [which] was nominated for 11 Grammys. Our mission is to expand the audience for jazz, and we really see that album as being very key in helping jazz have a banner year. Even though he rhymes over it, if you take the rhymes off, there are session jazz players, and one of the producers is a jazz artist who had heavy influence on that album. So that’s very positive, getting that in front of so many people and for it to be so well received. That’s where jazz is right now: It’s blurred lines between millennial soul and hipster jazz and is breaking away from more traditional boundaries of jazz.
Is it ever difficult to keep things fresh – to continue to come up with new ideas?
That’s one reason why we probably haven’t put down roots as far as having a venue. I like being able to partner with different presenters or venues and help them get people there and develop their programs. That’s one plus to not having our own physical space: We do keep it fresh and jump around from place to place, and it’s never really the same experience twice. When we program our festival, it’s curated with our demographics in mind. Some festivals really have only one demographic that they are shooting for, very niche and targeted, and ours is more like a gateway to jazz. We want it to be welcoming to more than just people who like what is traditionally called jazz. We want all people to see the festival as entry points to jazz. You know, we are your friends and neighbors putting on this crazy festival; the grit and will to do this is so authentically Durham. That’s the thing that we want people to remember. In all our progress of the hotels and the bigger festivals and all of that, there is still something that represents … the jazz and the soul that everybody can put into. Our festival is just a feel-good festival, and it’s for everybody.
How can the community get involved and be supportive other than just attending the festival?
Telling people. Just going to the website and checking out our Spotify, and following us on Facebook, Instagram, Periscope. We tweet daily content for people to get to know our lineup and our mission. If you feel inclined and you want to come and party with us that weekend, get a ticket, and encourage your friends and family, too. That’s Mother’s Day weekend, so we do see it as a great opportunity to treat your mom because there are some more traditional acts. For volunteers, we are using wayfinders.com this year, and you can sign up on our website [at aocfestival.org/volunteer]. We need volunteers to help with everything from setting up green rooms to making sure that the footprint is clean and that there’s signage everywhere all the way to just doing guerilla marketing, like putting up flyers.
Explain more about this new venture of yours, So When Do I Clap?.
This kind of sprang out of Art of Cool – over time, people have come to talk to me about my thoughts on their programming at their venue in general, not just in the land of jazz. I’m good at creative thinking, latching on to an idea and helping people think it through. With Art of Cool, we’ve done focus groups and surveys and marketing, and that has become appealing to some presenters and venues. So I was like, let me just make a separate entity. It’s like a blog and like consulting. My first client is Beyu Caffe, and I’ll be helping [owner Dorian Bolden] do a little bit of statistical research and also help with the creative directorship, steering the programming here for the new shop. It’s just like a side thing; we’ll see where it takes me.
What’s one lesson that has stuck with you from these past five years?
Just remain open. You never know what path you’re supposed to take. Be free-thinking. Go with the flow of the opportunities that are coming your way.
