Guitarist Steve Oliver and saxophonist Jeff Kashiwa perform at the 32nd Balcones Heights Jazz Festival at Wonderland of the Americas in July 2025.
Robert Merrill/Photo courtesy of the City of Balcones Heights
Fans sit in lawn chairs at the hillside at Wonderland of the Americas listening to jazz artists performing at a past Balcones Heights Jazz Festival.
Robert Merrill/Photo courtesy of the City of Balcones Heights
Thousands of fans sit in lawn chairs at the hillside at Wonderland of the Americas listening to jazz artists performing at a past Balcones Heights Jazz Festival.
Photo courtesy of the City of Balcones Heights
This Friday night, thousands of smooth jazz fans will fill lawn chairs across the hillside near Wonderland of the Americas Mall to enjoy the sounds of the 33rd Annual Balcones Heights Jazz Festival.
This year’s festival will open at 7:30 p.m. with trumpeter and vocalist Ilya Serov followed by headlining saxophonist Tom Braxton at 9 p.m. Attendance and parking are free and open to the public.
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Organizers encourage attendees to arrive early at the mall, located at 4522 Fredericksburg Rd. The event is presented by the City of Balcones Heights and iHeartMedia, with catering by Celebrations.
Longtime host and emcee David Muñoz said he doesn’t consider the festival work, but a labor of love. The host of Smooth Jazz San Antonio on Q101.9 HD.2 said hosting his Sunday morning jazz show for 29 years has allowed him to become acclimated with many artists over the years.
“The audience has loved it and we’re excited about this year’s event being another success,” Muñoz said.
A labor of love
The festival’s origin dates to 1994, when Muñoz and a sales manager met with the general manager at Wonderland of the Americas, then called Crossroads of San Antonio. The brainstorming session launched a multi-week KQ102 Summer Jazz series. In 1998, Balcones Heights joined as sponsor of the jazz festival, he said. Since then, the event has drawn nearly 2,500 to 3,000 people annually.
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“People literally put their chairs in place as early as the Sunday before the Friday show,” he said. “So, they’re there five full days before the show date, and the chairs stay in place.”
Muñoz also hosts several other jazz events at different venues, including the Big Bib Too Event Center at the corner of Austin Highway and Lanark Drive. The owner, Stanley Shropshire, opened the venue that hosts one national act monthly for two Saturday night shows. Muñoz said recording artists such as Peter White, Rick Braun and Jeff Kashiwa have performed at the Balcones Heights Jazz Festival and Big Bib center.
Baptism into smooth jazz
A San Antonio native, Muñoz grew up on the South Side curious about the smooth transitions from song to song by DJs he listened to on the radio. According to the San Antonio Radio Hall of Fame, the 2021 inductee began practicing his vocal chatter, but stuttering proved a challenge.
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In 1972, Muñoz found help from a speech professor in the Radio-Television-Film department at San Antonio College. She told him that people have so much on their minds that they want to say that comes out faster than their mouths can move. With practice he overcame the speech disorder. In February 1973, Muñoz worked on the SAC show at KTSA where he learned to become an on-air personality.
In 1974, he moved to KTFM, where in late 1975 he was introduced to smooth jazz. Working the midday shift, he played records by popular rock artists, including Aerosmith, Jethro Tull and Led Zeppelin. One day, the program manager brought him three jazz albums and asked him to play one song from each record.
The three artists were saxophonist Grover Washington Jr., guitarist George Benson and singer Michael Franks. After listening to a song from each, he discovered “really good music” that led to him spinning tunes by other jazz musicians and bands.
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“That’s how I got what you could call the baptism into smooth jazz,” Muñoz said, “and still going at it.”