“Christmas Around the World”
Friday, December 15, 2023 at 7:30 p.m. / Maltz Performing Arts Center
Sunday, December 17, 2023 at 2:30 p.m. / Lorain Palace Theatre
This year, the CJO puts a global spin on the holidays, featuring the Downbeat winner, local favorite, and rising jazz star Ava Preston.
Ava Preston
Ava Preston is an 18-year-old vocalist and songwriter from Cleveland, Ohio. When performing her wide array of jazz and blues standards, audience members often describe her as an “Old Soul.” Ava is a 2023 YoungArts Finalist and Silver Award Winner for Jazz Voice. She is also a 11x national Downbeat Student Music Award Winner: 6x for Vocal Jazz Soloist 2018-2023 and 5x for Blues/Pop/Rock Soloist 2018, 2020-2023. Ava was selected as the vocalist for the Next Generation Jazz Orchestra, which brings together 20 of the most accomplished high school jazz musicians in the country, culminating in a main stage performance at the 2023 Monterey Jazz Festival in September.
An active singer in Northeast Ohio, she began her career singing at a jazz club when she was 10-years old. A few years later she was featured at a number of local venues including The Bop Stop, BluJazz+, Nighttown, Beachland Ballroom, Brothers Lounge, The Standard, Tri-C JazzFest, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, to name a few. She has also performed with the Cleveland Jazz Orchestra, Dominick Farinacci, Swingbone, Moises Borges, and is the lead singer for two 17-piece big bands: Swing Time Big Band and Swing Era Big Band.
On the national scene, Ava has performed at Jazz at Lincoln Center - Dizzy’s Club (NYC), Birdland Jazz Club (NYC), Small’s (NYC), Bluebird Café (Nashville), Andy’s Jazz Café (Chicago) and the Monty Alexander Jazz Festival (Easton, MD). Ava has been privileged to perform with such jazz greats as Christian McBride, Monty Alexander, John Clayton, and Sullivan Fortner. In 2017, Ava was honored to sing for Wynton Marsalis, who said she had “a gift…a lot of talent and personality.” In 2019, legendary band leader and composer Paul Shaffer watched Ava perform her original song “Toy Solder” and said, “That was a terrific song. You have a big future ahead of you.”
As an aspiring songwriter, Ava has recorded a number of original songs that span jazz, indie, and pop/rock. Steve Bogard, songwriter of ten number one country songs, recognized Ava’s songwriting ability when she was 11-years old at his songwriter’s camp and encouraged her to visit Nashville. Ava released “Toy Solder” in 2020 and is releasing three more originals in 2023. A passionate consumer all types of musical genres and styles, she also loves to sing in French, Spanish and Portuguese. Ava draws inspiration from jazz legends like Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Cyrille Aimee and Astrud Gilberto along with pop singer/songwriters like Sara Bareilles and Alanis Morissette.