‘I saw Herbie Hancock play with D’Angelo, and got my head blown off!’: the festival keeping alive jazz’s golden age
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- North Sea jazz festival celebrates its 50th anniversary this year at Rotterdam's Ahoy warehouse complex, growing from its 1976 founding by publishing magnate Paul Acket at a The Hague venue with shows running 4pm to 4am to more than 1,000 artists and 90,000 attendees annually.
- Senior programme manager Sander Grande says the 1990s were defined by "warring jazz factions" sharing lineups, with the Marsalis family's New Orleans traditionalists appearing alongside acid-jazz acts like Gilles Peterson and hip-hop artists such as Guru sampling jazz.
- The Bird club, which opens nightly after headliners finish, became famous for impromptu jam sessions — trumpeter Roy Hargrove regularly played there with Erykah Badu and D'Angelo in the late 1990s, while in 2011 Prince took over the venue for three straight nights until dawn, inviting guests from Seal to Carlos Santana.
- Pianist Robert Glasper, a 15-time North Sea performer and Grammy winner, returns in 2026 with three shows including one alongside bassist Christian McBride and drummer Questlove performing all-new material, and called North Sea "the best music festival in the world" thanks to its late-night culture.
- Bebop veteran Kenny Barron recalled first performing at the festival in the late 1970s and being recruited mid-airport by drummer Grady Tate and singer Marlena Shaw to finish their European tour after their pianist dropped out.
- The 2025 lineup balances R&B, soul and Afrobeats — including Burna Boy — against jazz luminaries Pat Metheny and Kris Davis, as organizers defend expanding beyond pure jazz to draw younger audiences while keeping an 80% annual return rate among existing attendees.
- Grande argues the genre is enjoying a "golden age," pointing to the UK jazz scene and Kendrick Lamar's use of Glasper on his records as evidence that "audiences will always seek out this music."
Why it matters: By programming Burna Boy alongside Pat Metheny and Kris Davis, North Sea's 50th edition tests whether a 90,000-attendee institution can refresh its audience (80% of whom return yearly) without alienating its jazz base — a balancing act Montreux and New Orleans have already leaned further into by booking Zara Larsson and Lorde.
