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Organist Joey DeFrancesco performing during the 2019 CGI Rochester International Jazz Festival at Temple Building Theater downtown.. After an attempt to save this year’s edition of the CGI Rochester International Jazz Festival by pushing it back a month and moving the location from downtown to the Rochester Institute of Technology campus in Henrietta, the event’s producers announced Monday that they were canceling the event.
Organizers said the festival would now be postponed by nearly a year to June 17-25, 2022 although it was not immediately clear where it would be staged.
“We will be back next year and are committed to making every effort to move forward in downtown Rochester and also explore expanding the festival with programming at Rochester Institute of Technology,” co-producer Marc Iacona said.
May 3, 2021
Rochester’s Park Avenue Festival wasn’t cancelled over fear of covid, it was cancelled over fear of protests.
That’s the opinion of various people knowledgeable about the situation. It’s also likely true for other festivals and events traditionally held in the city of Rochester – to include the Corn Hill Festival, the Flower City half marathon and the International Jazz Festival.
While state rules on public gatherings have been either impossible or not forthcoming, and cooperation from city officials has been non-existent, there have been two insurmountable obstacles: No way to overcome feared Black Lives Matter protests, and the understaffed Rochester Police Department.