Enjoy jazz
Enjoy Jazz is an international jazz festival held annually over a period of six weeks in October and November , which takes place in the cities of the Rhine-Neckar region of Heidelberg , Mannheim and Ludwigshafen am Rhein .
history
The festival was founded in 1999 based on an idea by festival director Rainer Kern. It was initially a series of events at the Karlstorbahnhof Heidelberg and grew in size in the following years, measured in terms of the number of events, the length of time and the number of venues. In the second year the festival expanded to Mannheim; Since 2002, venues in Ludwigshafen am Rhein have also been an integral part.
While in 1999 the program included a total of 15 concerts, in 2007 there were already more than 60 events. In total, the festival is visited by over 20,000 guests each year.
idea
From the beginning, the concept of the festival was designed with the trend-setting idea of not only presenting musicians, but also always accompanying current developments. The festival therefore relies on a balanced mix of jazz greats and exceptional young talents. Following the addition "international festival for jazz and other", bands are always booked whose musical work goes beyond the difficult-to-define boundaries of jazz, and who are within the adjacent genres such as classical, pop, rock, hip-hop, Moving electro and ambient. In the first nineteen editions Till Brönner , Ornette Coleman , Jack DeJohnette , Richard Galliano , Jan Garbarek , Charlie Haden , Herbie Hancock , Roy Hargrove , Lee Konitz , Nils Landgren , Joe Lovano , Brad Mehldau , Nils Petter Molvær , David Murray played , Joshua Redman , Dianne Reeves , Heinz Sauer & Michael Wollny , John Scofield , Archie Shepp , Wayne Shorter , Esbjörn Svensson Trio , Erik Truffaz and McCoy Tyner . The following artists, who are more likely to be assigned to hip hop or electronica , also played: Phillippe Cohan Solal , DJ Grazzhoppa's DJ Bigband , Guru , DJ Jazzy Jeff , Kinderzimmer Productions , Lychee Lassi , St. Germain , Kyoto Jazz Massive , Nightmares on Wax and Tosca .
Ornette Coleman's album, recorded during the festival in 2005 and later released under the name Sound Grammar , received a Grammy nomination and the Pulitzer Prize for Music.
In 2007, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung even let itself be carried away to the conclusion that "not New York, Montreux or The Hague [...] the most extensive jazz festival in the world, but Heidelberg, Mannheim and Ludwigshafen."
The French newspaper Le Monde wrote after visiting a festival in 2009 that Enjoy Jazz "[is] a festival that is unparalleled in Europe".
Enjoy Jazz received special recognition in 2017 through a report in the American trade journal Down Beat . The festival program “put together with good taste” and the appearance of Erwin Ditzner's Carte Blanche on October 23, 2017 in the old fire station in Mannheim were particularly praised.
financing
Only a small part of the festival is financed from public funds. The budget, which in 2007 was around 700,000 euros, consists primarily of sponsorship money. In the first few years, the software developer SAP acted as the main sponsor. When they shifted their commitment in the corporate social responsibility area to sporting activities in 2005, SAS Germany - also a software manufacturer based in Heidelberg - took over the main funding. In addition, Enjoy Jazz has been supported for several years by the Ludwigshafen-based chemical giant BASF , whose company-owned event venues also host festival concerts.
Enjoy Jazz is a member of the Europe Jazz Network and the partner festival of Nancy Jazz Pulsations .
Venues
The main venues of the Enjoy Jazz festival are the Karlstorbahnhof in Heidelberg , the Alte Feuerwache in Mannheim and the BASF after-work house in Ludwigshafen .