JUNE KATZ has been singing vocals with acclaimed jazz pianist MILES BLACK accompanying her on both piano and guitar since she was a part owner and music manager at Alma Street Café, Vancouver’s premier jazz venue from the mid 1980s to ’90s. She has also performed numerous times with Vancouver’s jazz greats Ron Johnston and Oliver Gannon. Now semi-retired, June recently hosted an intimate performance with Miles at The University Women’s Club at Hycroft.
“I had jazz in my amniotic fluid and music in my soul,” says the Brooklyn-born songstress, referring to being raised in its hot jazz scene in the 1950s. She went on to teach high school English in Florida and, when she moved to Vancouver in 1973, three sons in tow, she started singing jazz by circumstance.
“This isn’t what I thought I’d be doing,” says the “godmother” to Ross Taggart and other then-emerging jazz artists. She recently dedicated her sixth CD, Mixed Bag, to her four grandchildren. Producer Miles Black noted in the sleeve that the album “especially captures June’s sincere and emotive delivery.”
EAN JACKSON and ENZO FEDERICO are long-time friends and passionate trail runners. They recently co-hosted the Trail Runner’s evening at the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival (VIMFF) in North Vancouver, where they proudly showed off their 100-mile Western States Endurance Race belt buckles, in recognition of the run they first completed in the 1980s.
Amongst many other races, ultra-marathon runner Ean finished the 180km Sunshine Coast Trail run in 2004, with an FKT (Fastest Known Time) of under 44 hours!
Both men, still working in their IT-related professions by day, have always found time, through tireless volunteer work, to support and pass on their love of trail running and other mountain sports.
Ean, co-founder of North Vancouver’s Club Fat Ass, and Enzo, co-founder of the Knee Knacker North Shore Trail Run, successfully entertained and kept the VIMFF audience in stitches on Trail Runners night. Their grand finale toss-out of door prizes into the audience of well-toned endurance athletes was well received by the politely competitive crowd.
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