‘I saw Herbie Hancock play with D’Angelo, and got my head blown off!’: the festival keeping alive jazz’s golden age

For a weekend in July each year, a vast warehouse complex in the port city of Rotterdam becomes home to the biggest names in jazz. Under the banner of the North Sea jazz festival, the labyrinthine, windowless space has played host to performances from the likes of Miles Davis, free jazz pioneer Ornette Coleman, singer Etta James, saxophonist Wayne Shorter and even Prince.

“We’ve had every major figure in jazz play for us over the past five decades,” senior programme manager Sander Grande says. “It’s the place where all the musicians want to hang and where audiences come to see art that is true and beautiful.”

Celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, the indoor festival has seen its fair share of late-night hangs and impromptu performances. “When it started, there were no other jazz festivals in the Netherlands,” festival director Irene Peters says. “Now we’ve grown to have more than 1,000 artists playing to 90,000 attendees.”

Read the feature in the Guardian.

[This piece was published on 03/07/26]