Köpenicker Blues and Jazz Festival
The Köpenick Blues and Jazz Festival has been taking place every summer since 1996 in Berlin-Köpenick . It lasts from the end of June to the end of August, making it the longest Berlin jazz festival . Around two thousand soloists, instrumentalists, national and international stars presented themselves from 1996 to 2007 and ensured a steadily increasing number of visitors. At the 12th festival in summer 2007, the 125,000 visitor was welcomed.
The initiator and organizer is Wolfgang Pinzl, the operator of the Köpenicker Ratskeller . The jazz expert Karlheinz Drechsel has acted as patron since 1996 . On ten summer weekends, from Friday to Sunday, the inner courtyard of the Köpenick town hall is transformed into a concert location that can accommodate over seven hundred visitors.
The total of thirty concerts are traditionally opened with the Louis Armstrong Memorial Five . The band around Tim Mohn was founded on the occasion of the first festival and has specialized in the early creative period of Louis Armstrong . Local stars perform regularly, including a. Uschi Brüning and Manfred Krug , both already in the 1970s when Klaus Lenz stood together on stage. Also Axel Zwingenberger , the master of boogie piano, Mr Acker Bilk , Klaus Doldinger and his band Passport or Jocelyn B. Smith repeatedly arise in Koepenick. Blues fans are invited to the "East Blues Session" every year by the Jonathan Blues Band . A special highlight is the street festival in Köpenick's old town on the opening weekend. Jazz, blues , boogie and Dixieland will be offered non-stop on four stages over three days .