Honokaa music hero Gary Washburn and the Dragon Jazz Band will team up with Texas blues legend Johnny Nicholas and his band Hell Bent for a circle-island concert tour in February. The tour picks up on February 11 at Kahilu Theatre in Waimea, concluding on February 12 at Gertrude’s Jazz Bar in Kona February 12. This is the fifth annual collaboration tour for Dragon Jazz-Hell Bent, after a two-year pandemic pause.
Washburn has been music director of Grammy Foundation Award-winning Honokaa High School for 40+ years. He created Dragon Jazz as a touring band for a select group of students who have proven themselves as strong performers, ready for a professional music experience. And year after year the students have stepped up, performing side by side with professional musicians like Nicholas.
“When my kids were in school, I realized there was a lot of support and money for sports, but not a lot for the arts,” Nicholas says.
“I created a program called the Big Band Bash in the local high school and middle school, and raised money for scholarships. It became a very successful annual event.”
“Seven years ago, when we came to Hawaii, we learned about Gary over here in Honokaa, and his program and how great it was, and what a gifted teacher he was,” says Nicholas. “And next year when we put together the tour, I contacted Gary and said, “what if we partnered up and incorporated your kids into the show?”
Nicholas has toured Hawaii many times with Hell Bent. Described as one of the premier blues and roots music interpreters and artists alive today, he has performed with blues legends, such as BB King, Big Walter Horton, Marcia Ball, and Johnny Shines.
He was one of the lead singers, writers and multi-instrumentalist in the band Asleep at the Wheel when they won their first of many Grammy Awards.
A Grammy Signature Schools Award was presented to Honokaa High School in 2011 thanks to the success of Washburn and the Jazz Band.
One of the best high school music programs in the state and the country, they have performed for four national conventions, National Public Radio’s “From the Top,” and the Big Island Jazz Festival, featured on CNN’s “Jazz Alley.”
Washburn himself is an award-winner, recognized as a Living Treasure of Hawaii by the Honpa Hongwanji Mission of Hawaii and the state Senate.
He is a member of the Oklahoma Jazz Hall of Fame, a Claes Nobel Educator of Distinction, and a two-time Na Hoku Hanohano Award nominee.
“The opportunity to tour and perform with Johnny Nicholas offers many educational opportunities not normally offered in the high school education system,” said Washburn.
“Students work with and experience the real professional tour and road expectations and responsibilities. Setting up, sound checking, rehearsing while on the road, and interacting with professional musicians offer great mentoring opportunities. It not only helps improve their musicianship, it inspires developing improvisational skills, and give them a chance to have fun at the same time.”