Jazz lovers rejoice – Manchester jazz festival is back with a bumper edition in 2025, as the festival celebrates its 30th anniversary festival.
Lighting up venues across the city, mjf2025 will see hundreds of northern, national and international jazz musicians descend on Manchester, showcasing the genre’s leading lights alongside its most exciting emerging talent.
It was first staged in the summer of 1996, hosting nine bands in one venue over the course of a single day. Who could have known that this would mark the start of what is now the City’s now longest running music festival, radiating across the city for 10 whole days each year. And yet, for all it’s grown, the festival’s spirit remains the same, rooted in the joyful celebration and genuine support of the contemporary jazz world’s diverse and local artists.
Building on the success of last year, it begins with a spectacular FREE opening weekender at the vibrant neighbourhood: First Street (mjf @ First Street) from 16 – 18 May, supported by House of Social. There will be three event stages: House of Social Main Stage, Ask Garden Stage and HOME stage, each celebrating the breadth and individuality of our home-grown scene and beyond:
Bands emerging through mjf’s artist development programmes alongside a host of northern success stories giving their homecoming performance (Mali Hayes, Olivia Cuttill, Phil Meadows).
The opening night shines a light on tomorrow’s talent, including Chetham’s students and a pop-up performance curated by the festival’s Youth Advisory Board, with family-friendly activities on Saturday morning.
House of Social, a brand-new food hall due to open at First Street in summer ’25, have joined as sponsors and will curate a section of the food offering – a preview of what’s to come when the two-storey venue opens later in the year.
There are four new venue partners for this year: Aviva Studios, home of Factory International; Low Four Studios, Flawd and Stage & Radio, alongside regulars and returning venues: St Ann’s Church, Matt & Phreds, RNCM, Forsyth Music Shop, The Stoller Hall and The Carlton Club.
The festival closes with an extended weekend-long party at Band on the Wall, with an afternoon showcase of international debuts at Aviva Studios.
They are also hosting a new mjf originals commission Richard Iles’Miniature Brass Emporium: New Futures II – revisiting mjf’s first ever commissioned work from 25 years ago, in which Richard profiled established and then-emerging players.
Fittingly reinvented for 2025, this performance brings together players from the original line-up with emerging players of today, supported by Granada Foundation and PRS Foundation.
Continuing its commitment to new work, mjf is one of the 20 organisations selected for the PRS Foundation’s 2025 New Music Biennial, for which they’ve commissioned sound artist Verity Watts to create City of P E A C E. Airing at mjf, Bradford UK City of Culture and South Bank Centre and broadcast on BBC Radio 3, the radical work uses turntables, spoken word, bassline improv and archive audio samples to ask us what peace sounds like in 2025.
The mjf piano trail competition is also making a comeback! manchester jazz festival and Forsyth Music Shop have joined forces once again for the mjf2025 piano trail competition
To find Manchester’s hidden talents across a trail of 15 street pianos at locations across Manchester city centre.
From 20 March – 31 May, the mjf2025 piano trail competition encourages everyone to get involved and share their creativity and just have fun! For those who want to take part, there’s a chance to enter a competition to win a Yamaha electric piano and many more prizes.
Alongside the piano trail itself, there will also be two bespoke piano trail walking tours available, run by Free Manchester Walking Tours (FMWT), on the 17 and 18 May (£10 per adult, children go free) and live performances at some of the pianos on the trail, more information to be announced soon.
Ticket prices for the festival start from £9.50 but there’s plenty of free-to-access music and activities taking place at locations across the city centre, including the whole of the opening weekender: mjf @ First Street, and gigs in the Copper Bar at Band on the Wall and at Matt & Phreds.
Also free is mjf’s international triple-bill on the final afternoon in The Social at Aviva Studios. The festival loves to share its passion for European jazz by bringing mjf audiences a taste of the finest artists from across the continent: this year they’ll debut Sylvain Rifflet’s We Want Stars (France), Nabou (Belgium) and Sanem Kalfa’s Miraculous Layers (The Netherlands). You’ll hear them first at mjf!
Tickets go on general sale at 10am on Friday 14 February atmanchesterjazz.com
