Jazz Baltica is a

jazz festival This is a list of notable jazz festivals around the world. Historic jazz festivals Jazz festivals by country The following is an incomplete list of notable jazz festivals, including both current and defunct festivals of note. Africa Angol ...

which was started in 1990. Up until 2011 it was held every summer in Schloss Salzau (Salzau Palace) near

Kiel Kiel ( ; ) is the capital and most populous city in the northern Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein. With a population of around 250,000, it is Germany's largest city on the Baltic Sea. It is located on the Kieler Förde inlet of the Ba ...

, Germany, and the coast of the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by the countries of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North European Plain, North and Central European Plain regions. It is the ...

. In 2009 the festival was directed by

Bengt-Arne Wallin Bengt-Arne Wallin (13 July 1926 – 23 November 2015) was a Swedish jazz composer, arranger, trumpeter, and flugelhorn player who played jazz influenced by Swedish traditional folk music. He also wrote film scores. Biography Wallin was born in ...

and in 2012, Swedish trombonist Nils Landgren took over as artistic director and it was moved to the Evers-Werft shipyard at the harbor of Niendorf, a Baltic Sea resort near

Lübeck Lübeck (; or ; Latin: ), officially the Hanseatic League, Hanseatic City of Lübeck (), is a city in Northern Germany. With around 220,000 inhabitants, it is the second-largest city on the German Baltic Sea, Baltic coast and the second-larg ...

. The festival attracts jazz musicians from around the globe and is a noted event on the yearly jazz calendar. Artists who have played at the festival include:

Wolfgang Dauner Wolfgang Dauner (; 30 December 1935 – 10 January 2020) was a German jazz pianist who co-founded the United Jazz + Rock Ensemble. He worked with Hans Koller, Albert Mangelsdorff, Volker Kriegel and Ack van Rooyen and composed for radio, televi ...

Marcin Wasilewski (pianist) Marcin Wasilewski (born 1975 in Slawno, Zachodniopomorskie) is a Polish pianist and composer. Wasilewski established a musical partnership with bassist Slawomir Kurkiewicz and drummer Michal Miskiewicz as the Simple Acoustic Trio in the earl ...

, Kate McGarry, and Nils Landgren, Gwilym Simcock. It differs from most other festivals in its intimacy and the access that visitors have to the musicians. The festival has changed its focus to feature primarily musicians from

Northern Germany Northern Germany (, ) is a linguistic, geographic, socio-cultural and historic region in the northern part of Germany which includes the coastal states of Schleswig-Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Lower Saxony and the two city-states Hambur ...

, Scandinavia and the Baltic countries. Between 20–23 June 2019 approximately 19,000 visitors celebrated the 29th edition of JazzBaltica in Timmendorfer Strand - 2000 more than 2018. Since 2002, Jazz Baltica has been conducted as part of the

Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival The Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival (SHMF) is a classical music festival held each summer throughout the state of Schleswig-Holstein in Northern Germany. History The festival was founded in 1986 by German concert pianist and conductor Justus Fr ...

. Until 2011 the festival's founder Rainer Haarmann was the musical director for most years. The festival takes place around the last weekend of June.Jazz Baltica Website
/ref> What makes this festival so unique is its intimate nature due to the relatively small concert venues, which limits the number of attendees to several thousand on any given day. This gives attendees unusually close-up access to jazz artists. The festival starts Friday afternoon and runs through Sunday night. It concentrates on music from bebop through to contemporary jazz with a smattering of world music. Besides the concerts that require tickets, there are also free midday concerts by young local musicians and free concerts in the late evening.

References

External links

Official site
{{Authority control Jazz festivals in Germany Culture of Schleswig-Holstein Tourist attractions in Schleswig-Holstein

Further reading

References

External links