In its 35-year history, there isn’t much the Jazz Cafe hasn’t done. Situated deep in the cultural heart of Camden, the iconic venue has hosted legends, launched careers, and permanently woven itself into the tapestry of London’s live music scene. It has morphed into your favourite musician’s favourite music venue – some of today’s brightest stars love playing the 500-capacity space, despite being more than capable of packing out larger rooms. One of the Jazz Cafe’s best selling points is its unique sense of intimacy, wherein established artists and up-and-comers alike can truly connect with audiences through a shared love of music, no matter the genre.
To celebrate more than three decades of success, the Jazz Cafe took a bold swing, opting to leave the walls of the vacated Barclays branch it has inhabited since 1990 and descend on South London for the inaugural Jazz Cafe Festival. Held on 15 September, the 15,000-capacity event brought the Jazz Cafe’s signature appeal to Burgess Park, with an impressive roster of genre-spanning acts performing across four stages. Led by headliner Nils Frahm, the stacked lineup featured the likes of ELIZA, Buena Vista All Stars, Earl Sweatshirt, The Alchemist, Rapsody, Moonchild Sanelly, and Arc de Soleil, among others.
From the outset, the idea of replicating the Jazz Cafe’s magic in the grassy expanse of Burgess Park seems like an ambitious one. How does a festival go about celebrating the venue’s history, while maintaining its addictive atmosphere for a crowd three times its usual size?
On the day of the festival, I arrive at Burgess Park in the early afternoon, and I’m immediately greeted by the sweet sounds of Buena Vista All Stars, a self-described timeless classic of Afro-Cuban nostalgia. The group is an offshoot of legendary Cuban ensemble Buena Vista Social Club, and features a slate of ‘all-star’ Cuban musicians, as well as rotating guest performers and, to our delight, dancers. The group is fronted by Ibrahim Ferrer Jr, son of original Buena Vista Social Club singer Ibrahim Ferrer. He greets the crowd briefly in English before switching to Spanish, but his message isn’t lost in translation. He asks us to dance, and everyone breaks into their own versions of the salsa, rumba, and cha cha cha. No one is succeeding quite like the pair of dancers performing their hearts out onstage, but everyone is giving it their best shot. The band play a few of Buena Vista Social Club’s biggest hits, and I can’t think of a better way to kick off the itinerary.
Next, I park myself on the risers situated at either side of the Plant Room, a stage set up inside a translucent tent on the edge of the festival grounds. Ojerime, a singer-songwriter from South London, is finishing up her set when I get there. She looks at home onstage, smiling from ear to ear as she delivers a series of her sleek, 90s R&B-inspired earworms from her 2020 album B4 I Breakdown, including Give It Up 2 Me and Whiskey Demo.
I stay put as Moonchild Sanelly erupts from the wings, commanding the room from the get go as she opens with Money Tree, a calmer cut from her 2022 album Phases. Before long, the energy in the tent skyrockets to the beat of Sanelly ’s kwaito-tinged electro pop as she launches into Demons, her 2021 collaboration with Sad Night Dynamite. The South African singer takes a moment to introduce herself, and her joy is infectious. I can’t think of a time I’ ve ever seen anyone quite so happy to be onstage. “I’m very excited to be here, so let’s fuck shit up,” she exclaims.
Over the next half hour, she cruises through a number of her genre-hopping tracks, including her latest singles Gwara Gwara, Big Booty, and Scrambled Eggs. Her DJ exits their position from behind the decks several times to join Moonchild up front for some synced up choreography, earning rapturous cheers from the audience. In between songs, she briefly teases plans for a new album, but clarifies her label would be upset with her if she actually announced anything. Big Booty’s lyrics, sung in both English and Xhosa, personally resonate with me, and as I listen to Moonchild sing, ‘If I had a big booty I’d fuck up the world / Oh wait I do, and I already am’, I silently wish for her set to go on forever.
Space on the risers becomes tight as the crowd turns over between acts. Barely ten minutes pass before Rapsody walks out – she greets the audience with a grin before shushing us into silence, delivering her first four bars of her opening song, Marlanna, acapella. From the jump, the Grammy-nominated rapper has the audience in the palm of her hand with her signature brand of introspective hip hop. She plays through songs from her latest album, Please Don’t Cry, her most vulnerable body of work to date. The album features a framing device where Rapsody portrays herself as attending a therapy session, and that’s exactly what her set feels like. She speaks straight to the heart, and delivers a world-class performance worthy of a much larger stage. In between songs, she tells us she almost walked away from music for good after releasing her critically acclaimed album Eve in 2019. What brought her back?“The purpose, and the love,” she says. “To know that I still have a place where people care.”
A little later, Rapsody joined onstage by Niko Brim, an up-and-coming rapper from New York who credits Rapsody with his discovery. The duo deliver a charismatic rendition of Raw, which features Brim alongside Lil Wayne (not present, for clarity). Brim leaves as Rapsody delves into some of her softer, more R&B-infused tracks from Please Don’t Cry, including 3:AM featuring Erykah Badu. As Badu’s voice plays from the speakers, accompanied by the song’s light jazzy chords, I can’t help but wonder how amazing it must be to watch Rapsody perform with a live band. The energy shifts again as Rapsody brings Brim back out to close with Back in My Bag. Rapsody and Brim cover every inch of the Plant Room stage as they rap over the thudding instrumentation. A girl in front of me yanks out her phone and opens Shazam. The song is that good.
At this point, the Plant Room is at risk of overflowing as festival goers cram inside the four walls to catch a glimpse of The Alchemist, who begins his set immediately after Rapsody vanishes down the corridor. I give up my coveted space on the risers to more dedicated Alchemist fans, and head back towards Parkway, where Swedish musical project Arc De Soleil is getting ready for its turn. Arc De Soleil is the latest venture assembled by producer, composer, multi instrumentalist, and mastermind Daniel Kadawatha, who leads the group through forty minutes of guitar-driven, groovy, wordless jazz numbers befitting of their sunset time slot. The group’s intricate guitar riffs and layered percussion reminds me of Khruangbin, with a bit more of a powerful edge.
What’s astonishing about Arc De Soleil’s performance is that it’s taking place just five months after the group’s debut live show, which happened at The Garage in Islington in March. The group emanates the polish of a much more established operation, owing perhaps to Kadawatha’ unique vision for the project. In interviews, Kadawatha described his goal of leaning away from an experimental sound and into a more natural one, creating space for strong melodies and multiple stringed instruments, like the guitar and sitar. The group appears to run slightly over their allotted time and are unable to complete their setlist, much to the crowd’s dismay. In lieu of performing their final song, the band members take a bow at centre stage as stagehands begin rapidly disassembling their equipment.
Out of all the acts, ELIZA surprises me the most. About 30 minutes after the conclusion of Arc de Soleil’s set, she struts into view flanked by her backup singers stroke dancers, and opens her set with Straight Talker. At this point, I’ve made my way to the barrier, and I’m blasted to hell by the bass emanating out of the stage-level speakers. ELIZA, whose 2018 outing A Real Romantic soundtracked much of my three years at uni, became known for her calm, melodic soul tunes after leaving her big label pop career as Eliza Doolittle behind and going independent in 2016. The tranquillity I associate with her music is nowhere to be found throughout her set – she performs her quiet songs vivaciously, parading around the stage and dancing choreographed increments alongside her backup singers, who are stars in their own right. She draws a massive crowd, and as the moon appears over Burgess Park, I sing her lyrics back to her, grateful for the chance to see her perform some of my favourite songs like Livid, Alone & Unafraid, and Wasn’t Looking. She also offers a few tracks from her latest project, A Sky Without Stars, including singles ME vs ME and Heat of the Moon. But her band is loud. At certain points, they drown out her voice. Is that just what being at the barrier is like? Is it the fault of the sound system? Or is it me?
As the night draws to a close and I watch Earl Sweatshirt perform from afar, unable to summon up the strength to wedge my way into the overflowing Plant Room tent, I reflect on my overall track record with music festivals. Truthfully, before the Jazz Cafe Festival, I hadn’t been to proper music festival since Warped Tour in 2013 in Nowheresville, Minnesota. Going into the day, I was excited to wipe my slate clean and start my journey anew. The Jazz Cafe Festival ended up being a perfect reintroduction into this world – the crowds were manageable, the organisation was fluid, and the grounds felt like the perfect size. As my only basis for omparison, I’m happy to report the Jazz Cafe Festival leads Warped Tour in every category, but that goes without saying. Apples and winged-eyeliner-and-chequered-Vans-wearing oranges.
So, how did the festival score against its initial goal of celebrating history while scaling way up? My two cents – pretty damn well. With an easygoing vibe and unmissable music, the Jazz Cafe Festival was an event worthy of its namesake. If it returns next year, don’t miss out.
Follow Jazz Cafe Festival On Instagram
Photographer: Jake Davis & Sophie Harbinson
Words: Madeline Anderson