Gamlestaden Jazz Festival is an international jazz festival in Gothenburg organized by the non-profit association and established in 2013. This festival is a local initiative to bring an international festival Gothenburg and celebrating the local scene as well as play a roll in the urban development. Since the association’s inception in 2013, it’s aims were to produce, promote and take part in the development of a high quality and professional jazz scene. The jazz festival itself is focused on modern cross-over jazz with the ambition to reach to a wider audience through programing, new ideas in audience experience/engagement and marketing. We are to open to how jazz can develop and grow as an art form. The festival has three values for which are starting points: Sustainability, Equality/Diversity and Youth development. We address these values in our programming and our engagement with the audience.

We support European Jazz in the artists we have been programming and we also look to other festivals and jazz scenes to get a perspective of the growing number of shapes and forms to present jazz. In 2014 we worked together with collaborating stage in Gothenburg to curate a concert that celebrated the United Nations International jazz day and invited a Danish saxophonist to perform with a Swedish group. We eagerly share our network with artists and producers in Europe to promote, stimulate and develop the European jazz scene. A concrete example is in the exchange of artists to promote diversity of programming and ideas from the diverse European Jazz scene.