THE Glasgow Jazz Festival's audiences have risen almost a third on last year.

The 33rd annual festival saw a 27 per cent increase in attendances this year, which staged more than 50 events across five days from19 to 23 June.

Jill Rodger, Director of Glasgow Jazz Festival, said: “2019 has been a bumper year for the Glasgow Jazz Festival and we’re really encouraged to see such an appetite for jazz from audiences.

"We always aim to bring a breadth of musical talent from local and international jazz scenes to the city and this year’s programme has had great appeal, with thousands of people enjoying the best musical performances in some truly stunning venues.

"It’s tremendous to see the event grow and to have successfully achieved our pledge to champion female talent in the industry.

"The calibre of talent across the five days of the festival was sensational."

Headliners included Ethiopian musician and arranger Mulatu Astatke, David McAlmont and The Old Fruitmarket triple bill of young Scottish bands Mezcla, Graham Costello’s Strata and the 14-piece instrumental collective Fat-Suit.

British Jamaican soul singer Ruby Turner also appeared as did Scottish Jazz Award Vocalist of the Year Georgia Cecile.

Scottish jazz bands were also showcased to 120 delegates from across the UK and Ireland.

www.jazzfest.co.uk.

The RGI Kelly Gallery is to show an exhibition of the paintings of Maria N Spadoni, an Italian Scottish artist.

It will run from 13 July to 10 August.

Maria N Spadoni, who lived from 1928 to 2014, came from Italy to Scotland in her late twenties to marry into an Italian-Scottish family.

In the late 1970s as she was turning 50 she began to draw and paint.

She exhibited some of her early work in the McLean Museum and Art Gallery, Greenock, to complement the works of Samuel Lovi, a Nigerian sculptor.

An encounter in 1982 with the artist and sculptor, George Wyllie, was a pivotal moment in Maria’s life.

George and Daphne Wyllie gave Maria her first one woman show at the Greenock Arts Guild in 1983.

George wrote: “Maria is a free spirit. She draws well on her own imagination, her personality and freely expresses herself.”

George and Daphne Wyllie remained life long supporters and friends.

In September 2018 an exhibition of selected work was held at The Studio and Gallery Kilbirnie, after her death in 2014.

The artist also wrote volumes of poetry, mainly in Italian, and regarded her paintings as "poems beyond language."

www.theroyalglasgowinstitute.com

THIS year marks the Scottish Glass Society’s 40th anniversary and to celebrate the Society will host an exhibition - On The Edge - at North Lands Creative in Lybster, Caithness, from 8 to 26 July and at the Trades Hall in Glasgow from 18 to 25 September.

On The Edge will include work from eighteen artists: Gregory Alliss, Carolyn Basing, Catherine Carr, Hannah Gibson, Siobhan Healy, Jessamy Kelly, Alison Kinnaird, Pinkie Maclure, Brett Manley, Inge Panneels, Lauren Puckett, Annica Sandström and David Kaplan, Cathryn Shilling, Amanda Simmons, Moonju Suh, Laura Turner and Rosheen Young.

North Lands is a studio and gallery organisation focussing on the production and presentation of contemporary glass.

Trades Hall in Glasgow is the home of Trades House bringing together the different crafts in the city with Glass sitting within the Incorporation of Wrights.

As well as coinciding with Doors Open weekend, the Glasgow exhibition will also include an open exhibition in addition to the juried one.

The open exhibition will include works by the Society’s members on the theme of ‘celebration’.

www.scottishglasssociety.com