Christopher BarrettThe team behind the Jazz Cafe, one of London’s longest standing music venues, is teaming up with production company The Fair to launch its first festival.
The 15,000-capacity Jazz Cafe Festival will take place across four stages on 15 September at London’s Burgess Park.
Headlined by Nils Frahm, the line-up is being overseen by Ruari Frew who has booked acts including ELIZA, Earl Sweatshirt, Alchemist, Buena Vista All Stars and Gilles Petersen.
Colombo Music promoter Ruari Frew said, “We’d been wanting to do this for years. Sadly the pandemic made survival the priority – we know this was, and is still, a sentiment echoed across small venues across the country. We have so many artists playing on our stage who go on to achieve huge things on the live side of the industry so it’s exciting to still be involved in their development and to have them perform in front of big audiences.
“Taking our programming beyond the four walls of Jazz Café is an incredibly exciting prospect for everyone involved in the venue.
“Seven days a week, for 35 years, we’ve been putting live music on stage. It’s what we truly love doing. The opportunity to do it on a bigger scale while staying true to our musical roots was unmissable. We just needed an appropriate location.”
Meanwhile, promoter Marcus Weedon, whose Brockwell Live launched the 8,500-capacity summer concert series South Facing at Crystal Palace Bowl in 2021, has teamed with Live Nation to launch an edition of the series curated by hit jazz drummer Yussef Dayes.
Among the acts to play the 4 August event will be Masego, Greentea Peng and Charlotte Day Wilson. It will be hosted by Munya Chawawa.