 Bernie Williams
By Preston Turegano
As fans flock to the Catalina Island JazzTrax Festival to savor
the final days of festival season this month, baseball enthusiasts
are cheering their favorite teams during playoff games for the
World Series. Over the past 22 years, JazzTrax festivalgoers rushed
downstairs to the Marine Bar during intermission to catch glimpses
of home runs, players stealing bases and to hear the final score
of each competition. For 16 of those years, Bernie Williams was
suiting up for the New York Yankees. Instead of at bat for a playoff
game this October, Williams will be off the field and taking the
stage at the 23rd Annual Catalina Island JazzTrax Festival.
There are times when former New York Yankees outfielder
turned jazz guitarist wonders if some of the people who come to hear him perform
are there just out of curiosity.
“I’ve been in so many situations where
baseball fans––specifically Yankees fans––who are not
really into jazz have come to a concert because they want to support a former
Yankees player,” Williams recently told Smooth Jazz News. “They
may be a little curious. Some probably say, ‘What is this guy doing?
Can he really play?’ My hope is that a lot of them leave pleasantly surprised.
Then, there are (jazz fan) skeptics who may be thinking this guy has no business
here and say ‘He’s just a baseball player who wants to try this
out.’”
Most likely a combination of smooth jazz enthusiasts,
prospective fans of the genre, baseball buffs and curious entertainment seekers
will be at the Avalon Casino Ballroom on Oct. 17 when Williams performs during
the final weekend of the Catalina Island JazzTrax Festival on Catalina Island––that
celebrated arid haven of fun and frolic 26 miles off the coast of Southern
California.
Consisting of three four-day weekends
of music-making, the annual festival begins in Avalon, California, Oct. 1.
 Having never been to the “island of romance,” Williams
is reading up on the history of the land that from 1921 until 1951 was the
spring training site of the Chicago Cubs, owned at the time by the Wrigley
family, which until 1975 also owned most of the island. The Wrigleys sold the
National League-affiliated Cubs to The Tribune Company in 1981 for $20.5 million.
Earlier this year, Tribune reached a written agreement to sell the Cubs, Wrigley
Field and other assets to the family of Joe Ricketts, TD Ameritrade founder,
for approximately $900 million.
Williams never played at Wrigley Field. His entire
16-year major league baseball career was with the American League-affiliated
Yankees from 1991 until 2006; he was a four-time World Series Champion and
a five-time All Star. He is among the Yankees’ all-time leaders in every
major batting category and has also earned four Gold Gloves for his excellence
in centerfield.
As a child in his native Puerto Rico, Williams embraced
sports and classical music. He was a track and field star as a teen, and attended
a performing arts school where he studied music. His late father was a merchant
marine who became an employee of San Juan County. Williams’ mother was
an English teacher who transitioned to school principal and later college professor.**
**The complete Bernie Williams feature story can be found in the
September issue of Smooth Jazz News. Pick up your free
copy at our radio station affiliates (see radio station page
for listings), various concerts, festivals and select Southern
California outlets. Or you can subscribe and
receive 11 editions of Smooth Jazz News per year, mailed monthly
(except January), for $35. Click here to subscribe online today.
For more information on Bernie Williams,
visit www.berniewilliams.com.
On Tour
Saturday, Oct. 17, 2 p.m.
23rd Annual Catalina Island JazzTrax
Festival
Avalon Casino Ballroom
1 Casino Way
Avalon (on Catalina Island), California
www.jazztrax.com
(866) 872-9849
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