Gibson Guitar Announces Partnership with 2009 Montreux Jazz Festival

Gibson Guitar, the world's premier musical instrument maker and leader in music technology, is pleased to announce its partnership with the Montreux Jazz Festival. Gibson will be the official musical instrument provider of the festival and Title Sponsor of the Gibson Montreux Jazz Guitar Competition.
The Montreux Jazz Festival will take place July 3-17, 2009 in the beautiful lakeside city of Montreux, Switzerland. Founded in 1967, the prestigious Montreux Jazz Festival has become a must-see event for music fans from all around the world. This two-week, multiple venue event now features musical styles of every genre imaginable, including Jazz, Blues, Rock, World and Electronic music. All the greats, including musical icons B.B. King, Ray Charles, Miles Davis and David Bowie, have performed on one of the festival's many stages. A highlight of this year's festival will be a rare guitar workshop by the legendary blues artist B.B. King on July 13 at 3:00pm at the Petit Palais.

Another highlight of the festival will be the multicultural “Gibson Montreux Jazz Guitar Competition". This competition was founded in 2004 by Claude Nobbs, the founder of the Montreux Jazz Festival, in memory of the great jazz guitarists of the past. To preserve this tradition, promising young guitarists of all nationalities are invited to demonstrate their skill to a panel of expert judges, which this year will include the legendary jazz guitar virtuoso and Gibson artist Lee Ritenour. The competition will take place over two days in the intimate setting of the Historic Montreux Palace hotel.
Gibson is especially pleased to congratulate this year's talented candidates for the Gibson Montreux Jazz Guitar Competition Semi-Finals! Hailing from all over the world, they are:

Roland Balogh (Hungary)
Eduard Brenneisen (France)
Sam Dickey (United States)
Greg Duncan (Canada)
Roy Guzman (Puerto Rico)
Akira Ishiguro (United States)
Thibault Leutenegger (Switzerland)
David Preston (United Kingdom)
Rotem Sivan (Israel)

The semi-finals will take place on Monday, July 13, 2009 starting at 4:30 p.m., with the finals following on Tuesday, July 14 starting at 5:00 p.m. Following the finals there will be an award ceremony with guitar prizes being presented by Lee Ritenour to the top four competitors: First Place will receive a Gibson ES Gibson ES 335 Dot, Second Place a Gibson Les Paul Traditional Goldtop, Third Place a Gibson SG Sparkle, and Fourth Place Gibson LP Studio. This event is free and open to all visitors!

Gibson is known worldwide for producing classic models in every major style of fretted instrument, including acoustic and electric guitars, mandolins, and banjos. Gibson's HD.6X-PRO Digital Guitar, the Gibson Robot Guitar and Gibson's Dark Fire represent the biggest advances in electric guitar design in over 70 years. Founded in 1894 in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and headquartered in Nashville since 1984, Gibson Guitar Corp.'s family of brands now includes Epiphone, Dobro, Kramer, Steinberger, Tobias, Echoplex, Electar, Flatiron, Slingerland, Valley Arts, Maestro, Oberheim, Baldwin, Sunshine Piano, Take Anywhere Technology, J&C Fischer, Chickering, Hamilton, and Wurlitzer.
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/php/news.php?id=38376