George Russell died yesterday from complications of Alzheimer's at the age of 86. Certainly his biggest contribution to the world of jazz was a book called The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization where he invented a concept of playing jazz based on scales and not on chord changes. The book was published in 1953 and two of its most prominent followers were both Davis and Coltrane.

Starting his career early on by playing with Benny Carter and Max Roach, he moved from his Cincinnatti home to New York where he soon encountered another great composer, Gil Evans. Russell composed the ground-breaking Cubana Be/Cubana Bop which was recorded by the Dizzy Gillespie Band in 1947 and which stands as the first piece of music mixing Bebop and Afro-Cuban rhythms. Russell moved to Europe in the 1960s and returned home at the end of that decade to work with Gunther Schuller. In the 70s, he led a big band which often played the US and Europe and he continued to compose impressive works up to the 90s, including the three-hour Time Line for Symphony Orchestra.

The North Sea Jazz Festival has developed into a major international jazz event. Over the years the numbers have increased to: fifteen venues, approximately thirteen hundred artists and a visitors number that varies between sixty-five thousand and seventy thousand every year. Since 2006 the festival has found a new and more spacious location: Ahoy Rotterdam. I'm more than happy to be a part of it once again this year being my 22nd at the world's biggest indoor jazz festival.

North Sea Jazz is known all over the world because of the many musical genres it has to offer, ranging from traditional New Orleans jazz, swing, bop, free jazz, fusion, avant-garde jazz and electronic jazz; to blues, gospel, funk, soul, R&B, hip hop, world beat and Latin. All of which are presented during a single weekend: 10, 11 and 12 July 2009.

Besides familiar names like Burt Bacharach, Herbie Hancock, Hank Jones, George Duke, Chaka Khan, George Benson, Erykah Badu, Nicholas Payton, Roy Haynes, David Sanborn, Joshua Redman, Cecil Taylor, McCoy Tyner, etc., the North Sea Jazz Festival also gives young talent a chance to make it on a major stage. Some names of artists who are introduced to a European audience: Ambrose Akinmusire, Aaron Parks, or Benjamin Herman.

This is what makes North Sea Jazz so unique - a festival where for three days the past, the present and the future of jazz music are presented, all under one roof.