Detroit Jazz Festival

This is my 20^th year attending the Djf. Organizers please address the sound quality coming from some of the stages. The cartthart stage is acoustically Dead. or maybe it is the guys running the sound board. I caught the Ron Carter trio with Russell Malone. Everyone around me was complaining about the lack of dynamics coming from the stage. Why bring in world class musicians if the audience cannot hear them 2015. Archie

Great free festival. Bring a cooler, chairs and check out one of the many great stages of jazz.

I’ve been to the Jazz Festival for many years. Normally I’d give the event 4 to 5 stars. This year was disappointing, and I’ll list reasons:
1) Not every stage had a schedule so it was difficult to find out who was performing.
2) Any good festival should have volunteers all over to not only answer questions but even just to smile and welcome you. This year there wasn’t a welcoming feel.
3) There were a lot of corporate banners this year. That’s fine but only if the spectator experience isn’t forgotten.
4) The programming ended earlier on a few stages on Monday than it ever has.
The positives, but each has caveats:
1) Great lineup this year for pure jazz lovers (one of the best, actually), but much lower crowds maybe due to lack of a mainstream «big name» performer.
2) Beautiful setup by the river, but having the main stage near Campus Martius is a mess (too crowded and too far from the rest of the event in Hart Plaza).
3) It’s free when most of the other music festivals in and near our beloved Motown are now charging fees (Movement, Hoedown, and Arts, Beats, and Eats). However, the festival may be losing some of its innovative spark and may be the second best free festival in the area now after the Concert of Colors.
Hopefully next year the Jazz Festival is more organized, a better spectator experience, and a more vibrant representation of the creative greatness of Detroit.

34 years old and still running strong, the Detroit Jazz Festival is the largest free jazz festival in the world. It’s also a great way to end the summer and look forward to the fall, my favorite time of the year. It’s always nice and mellow, even if there’s throngs of people. Of course, it’s more sprawling than it used to be having spilled out of Hart Plaza and flowed up Woodward to Campus Martius and Cadillac Square. I guess the Cadillac Square stage is considered the main stage now, but I still prefer the ampitheater in Hart Plaza. The acoustics are just so much better, although that damned concrete bowl does get pretty steamy if the sun is beating down. (There is the fountain for cooling off, although it seems I’m the only adult who will walk right onto the metal grating at the center for a good soaking.)
The Riverfront stage got a nice repositioning this year, being turned away from the plaza rather than facing it. It seems to make it more its whole own area, and bring it closer to the river. It’s nice and shady there, too. I didn’t catch anything at the pyramid stage this year, but that seems to be where they put more oddball, experimental stuff.
There’s lots of vendors, although they’re not using the subterranean level of the plaza as a food court anymore. Disappointing, since I couldn’t find Carribean Citchen for Curried Goat.
i only made it down on Monday this year, but I did hear a nice set of Duke Ellington covers. There was a 65 person vocal choir at the Cadillac Square stage but I decided to forego that as I was geared up for jazz and it didn’t seem all that jazzy. Not everything at the Jazz fest is my cup of tea, but there’s enough variety so I can find something that is. I’ve heard bland modern smooth jazz, but I’ve also seen Sun Ra’s Arkestra perform as well as Chaka Khan. That’s why I can’t complain about the vocal choir. Not really jazz, but neither is Chaka Khan. And it was sure nice to see her.