Paris’ most forward-thinking jazz festival is back! Jazz à la Villette offers dozens of concerts, a big (and free!) swing ball, a special selection of improvised music dubbed Under The Radar, and a selection specially curated for kids – Jazz à la Villette for kids – which includes workshops for the whole family!

Paris is definitely the place to be for jazz! Just a few months after the Saint-Germain-des-Prés Jazz Festival near our hotels, it’s time for La Villette to showcase a wider, forward-thinking definition of jazz that can sometimes include a little electronica or even rap.

Jazz à la Villette‘s slogan is jazz is not dead, and the line-up this year includes some tasty-looking events, such as the Respect à Aretha night on 10th September (book here) paying homage to Aretha Franklin, with Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, Bettye LaVette, José James, Alice Russell, Nona Hendryx & Zara McFarlane.

Another highlight of the festival will no doubt be the concerts and workshops for kids – Jazz à la Villette for kids. You’re never too young to start liking jazz ?

And let’s not forget the free, open-air swing ball on 1st September, with the Umlaut Big Band transporting you back to the heyday of swing in the 1920s/1930s (precisely the period that inspired our very own Hotel Baume !)

If you want to see what last year’s selection sounded like, the festival’s website has excerpts of concerts (and sometimes full concerts) here and here, and you might like to know that you can book your tickets already, either for individual concerts (usually reasonably-priced) or at a special low rate if you want to see a minimum of three concerts.

French speakers can get more in-depth info on every artist performing by checking out the press release at the bottom of this article.

The Jazz à la Villette Festival is happening at and near la Villette (map of venues here) from 29th August – 10th September 2019

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Tp check out the press release for the festival, simply click the ‘fullscreen’ button at the bottom right of the image below.