New York, NY - The Humpty Dumpty Institute (HDI) works around the world to inform and foster dialogue amongst critical stakeholders on key global issues. We do this through our programs with the U.S. Congress and the United Nations, engaging young people, supporting cultural diplomacy, and working on humanitarian programs.
HDI is committed to supporting cultural diplomacy to promote dialogue. We have worked with more than 75 U.S. Embassies and Consulates to bring American culture to countries worldwide.
We are thus especially proud to have employed a proven vehicle of cultural diplomacy, the uniquely American art form of jazz, in the Republic of Uzbekistan.
Collaborating with the U.S. Embassy in Tashkent, HDI sent one of our cultural envoys, the renowned female-led jazz quartet, Ginetta’s Vendetta, to inaugurate the Sixth International Jazz Festival in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, April 30-May 3, 2022. This program was especially meaningful to HDI as it was organized under the auspices of UNESCO’s Tashkent Office.
Ginetta’s Vendetta performed in the cities of Tashkent, Khiva, and Samarkand. The concert at the State Conservatory of Uzbekistan was a highlight of the program, the oldest institution of music education in Central Asia. As with all HDI cultural diplomacy programs, Ginetta’s Vendetta collaborated with local musicians by teaching seminars, conducting musical workshops, giving media interviews, and engaging disabled communities. Views of videos and posts of Ginetta’s Vendetta’s Uzbekistan tour reached over 100,000 social media users.
Jazz diplomacy has a long history. Among the most academically studied examples of jazz diplomacy was the U.S. Jazz Ambassadors Program in the 1950s. Historians credit the U.S. Jazz Ambassadors program, which focused on the Soviet bloc, as a useful instrument of cultural diplomacy that helped transform the relationship between the United States and the Soviet bloc. The program was a highly effective way of helping change the perception of citizens in the countries of the Soviet bloc toward the United States. These early jazz programs laid the groundwork for this uniquely American art form of jazz to remain immensely popular throughout Central Asia, including in Uzbekistan.
HDI would like to thank the Public Affairs Section of the U.S. Embassy Tashkent for organizing this important program.
