Jammin’ Juan, now in its eighth edition, is a showcase festival set on the French Riviera, close to the legendary Pinède, which has hosted the famous Juan-les-Pins festival every July since 1960. Evolving from a role as a market for jazz professionals, Jammin’ Juan is now attracting growing audiences eager to discover emerging talents, with musicians who have passed a rigorous selection process from among hundreds of candidates across the European jazz scene. The three-day festival, held at the Palais des Congrès from 29 to 31 October, offered no fewer than 18 showcases and three evening concerts.
Day 1 opened at 2pm prompt with Swiss vocalist Lea Maria Fries presenting her debut album, Cleo. She composed most of the material herself and the work felt intimate and personal. Despite the early hour, she managed to captivate the audience. Following her, South African singer Pilani Bubu teamed up with Marthe X, a French trans-oriental jazz-rock quartet founded in 2017. Drawing her inspiration from Nguni, Zulu and Xhosa prayers and protest songs, Pilani, the “woman in red” (as that was how she was dressed that day), paid tribute to female anti-apartheid activists.
Glancing at a picture of Bill Evans in the hall, I couldn’t help thinking how the piano-trio format remains very much alive today – five of the 18 showcases featured trios, not least Patrick Cascino’s evening concert, ahead of his new album release in February 2026. The first trio could even be called a quartet, since its leader, pianist Jean Saint Loubert, occasionally played the flugelhorn while at the keyboard. With a background in classical and baroque music, the young pianist explained how a first trip to Spain opened him to new musical languages. That memory inspired El Sueño, a piece clearly influenced by flamenco. Cleverly blending various influences, his set was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the opening day. Matching his artistry, the next two piano trios – Verb and the Baptiste Bailly Trio – each brought their own flavour, avoiding any sense of déjà vu.
Day 2 notably featured the warm, sensual voice of Estelle Perrault. In her quintet, she found an engaging foil in Chicagoan pianist Rob Clearfield, who recently relocated to Marseille, finding the southern city more to his taste than Paris. Though Perrault’s set consisted mainly of originals, her interpretation of Burt Bacharach’s Close To You was as refined as her own compositions. When Clearfield briefly switched from keyboard to guitar, the song’s famous line “Why do birds suddenly appear?” had me thinking that, in this case, they surely weren’t the pesky seagulls of the Riviera.
Traditionally, each evening in the amphitheatre, the largest hall of the Palais des Congrès, features established artists performing full-length concerts. For her first appearance in Juan-les-Pins, Cape Verde’s Carmen Souza enchanted the crowd with her unclassifiable melodies. Teaming up with longtime collaborator and bassist Theo Pascal, she brought along Elias Kacomanolis on drums and Jonathan Idiagbonya on piano.
Before the Cuban closing act, Day 3 had opened with Luxembourg’s Dock in Absolute. Jean-Philippe Koch and his two bandmates showed no signs of jet lag after their recent China tour, which had taken them to seven different locations. A group with two other globe-trotters followed: the Obradovic Tixier Duo. After their passage to India, they incorporated traditional Indian sounds into their music. Their set painted the stage in vivid colours, just like the sleeve of their latest album Jiggled Juggle. Croatian drummer Lada Obradovic’s shifting rhythms found an elegant echo in David Tixier’s subtle harmonic changes.
Speaking of colours, pianist Cédric Hanriot presented Time Is Colour 2. For the French pianist, time and colour are deeply connected – and perhaps by coincidence, his green shirt perfectly matched the green trousers of hip-hop vocalist Nunny. Their urban soundscapes, full of electronic textures, weren’t always easy to follow, but Hanriot’s lyrical passages periodically reignited the audience’s attention.
The festival wrapped up with a joyful Afro-Cuban concert by Michael Olivera’s Madrid-based Cuban Jazz Syndicate. Playing to a packed house, the internationally acclaimed drummer and his ensemble paid tribute to Tito Puente and other Cuban luminaries – a vibrant finale worthy of Jammin’ Juan’s eighth edition.
Stepping out of the overheated amphitheatre into the cool Riviera night, it was time to head back to the nearby hotel, dreaming of my next jazz destination. With or without seagulls? That is the question.
Jammin’ Juan, Juan-les-Pins, France, 29-31 October, 2025
