Home » Tourism

Nice Jazz Festival quits Cimiez

23 June 2010 7,862 views 6 Comments

After last year’s fall in attendance, Nice’s mayor Christian Estrosi has declared the Nice Jazz festival will move the historic site of Cimiez to around Place Massena from next year.

Update: here is the Nice jazz festival line-up 2011.

After falling attendance, 4,800 to 4,400 from 2007-2008, the mayor has pinned the blame on the high price of tickets (€30-€50). The solution? Nearly double the capacity of the festival from 5,000 places to over 9,500 and lower ticket prices. The two principal sites will be the arena in the Albert 1er gardens with a capacity of 3,000 and the gardens next to Place Massena itself which can accommodate 6,500.

According to Nice Matin, the square will be surrounded by a “cultural and artistic village”. Once the bus station has been demolished and turned into gardens, this will be another possible venue for the concerts.

Though swapping olive trees for palm trees may give it a different ambiance, the idea of widening the audience is in principle is a good one if a semblance of the relaxed ‘picnic’ atmosphere can be maintained at the new sites.

In the mean time, here is the line-up for the Nice Jazz Festival 2010.

1 Star2 Stars3 Stars4 Stars5 Stars (1 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)
Loading ... Loading ...
Post comment as
twitter logo facebook logo
Sort: Newest | Oldest

We started going first about 15 years ago when we first arrived in the region. At that time it was really unique with a fantastic and relaxed atmosphere. I felt the atmosphere going down drastically when the organisation was taken over by a Parisian company. There was no trouble before but all of a sudden there were strict security checks, certain pic-nic items were not allowed to be brought in, so one was obliged to buy on-site at inflated prices and then the ticket prices started going up as well. I can't see the atmosphere improving in the centre of Nice at all. I can only see it going down further. Pity!!

share
  • spam
  • offensive
  • disagree
  • off topic
 Like

Go every year but the last few times the line up hasn't been as strong as previous years which has been a little disappointing - maybe that has something 2 do with tickets not selling also- hope that the atmosphere doesn't get lost in the move

share
  • spam
  • offensive
  • disagree
  • off topic
 Like

I've been photographing at the Nice Jazz Festival since 1982. Cimiez was special with it's relaxed garden atmosphere and regional food. I shall miss that unique site as well. Still, in town, beach and palm trees could work. Good luck to
To the organisers.

share
  • spam
  • offensive
  • disagree
  • off topic
 Like

Compared to festivals in other cities imo the prices weren't too high, taken into concern that quite a couple of groups were offered each night. But yes, also we chose single evenings with groups that interested us instead of "weed through" the whole festival. Nevertheless, the truely named picnic-atmosphere indeed was appreciable. Let's hope the best, we will come for sure, as Nice is worth travelling each time anyways ;-)

share
  • spam
  • offensive
  • disagree
  • off topic
 Like

Really good article. We have been travelling from Brighton England, for the last 10years, to this festival. We have seen some incredible artists over the years including BB. King, through to Katie Mellua, Van Morrison,Joss Stone,Madelaine Peyroux etc etc. Wonderful memories but it has got really expensive now so we only go if we want to see someone special instead of 3or 4 times. The atmosphere and ambience is very unique and we wonder if it can be replicated in the city itself but we will give it a try.Looking forward to it already

share
  • spam
  • offensive
  • disagree
  • off topic
 Like

Trackbacks

  1. Nice Jazz Festival 2011 says:
    April 12, 2011 at 6:20 pm

    [...] great as last year’s jazz festival in Cimiez and jazz musiciens were, this year marks the start of a whole new tradition. We are looking forward [...]