ST. CATHARINES – In The Soil Arts Festival has partnered with The Niagara Jazz Festival to bring live jazz to downtown St. Catharines this weekend.

The festival offers two shows back-to-back Saturday, April 25th at the Niagara Artists’ Centre, at 354 St. Paul Street, St. Catharines.

At 8 p.m., it’s The Worst Pop Band Ever: Described as the ugly lovechild of Radiohead and Miles Davis, the WPBE straddles genres and challenges expectations. What initially began as a one-off idea nearly a decade ago has morphed into playing at festivals and packed clubs throughout North America.

At 9 p.m., it’s the The Ken MacDonald Quartet: A modern jazz quartet playing original compositions that draw influences from various worldly sources. Bassist Ken McDonald formed the quartet in the winter of 2008. The band’s regular members consist of Paul Metcalfe, Lowell Whitty and Demetri Petsalakis, but also features a string of regular outside contributors including Dave Clark and Tom Richards. The band’s debut record “Pay What You Can” was released in 2011 and its second, “Sitting, Waiting, Wasting Time,” was released April 3.

In The Soil Arts Festival is a three-day celebration of creativity featuring more than 150 acts and installations in theatre, music, dance, media, streetscape and interactive art that take over the expected and unexpected spaces of St. Catharines downtown.

The festival nurtures the creation of new work, showcases talent, encourages innovation, offers learning opportunities for youth and provides intimate and uncommon platforms for audiences to experience work by contemporary performing and literary artists, musicians and media artists.

Tickets and festival passes can be purchased atwww.inthesoil.on.ca.

The Niagara Jazz Festival will take place at outdoor venues in the heart of Niagara’s wine country July 23-26, 2015. Updates on performers and venues can be found atwww.niagarajazzfestival.com.