Monterey Jazz News & Notes
July 17, 2025
A Festival is Born (1958)
After the success of the Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island beginning in 1954, Jimmy Lyons and Ralph Gleason combined Rolodexes in 1956 and contacted the jazz elite...
February 10, 2025
Jazz comes to the Monterey Peninsula with Concert by the Sea (1955)
Even though Jimmy Lyons had left San Francisco for the more pastoral environment of Big Sur on the Central Coast in 1953, he didn’t stray far from being a jazz impresario or...
February 10, 2025
How it all started! Jimmy Lyons on the air and Dave Brubeck’s influence and success (1940s – 1953)
In the era before Monterey Jazz Festival was founded, the building blocks for the idea of an outdoor festival originated with deejay Jimmy Lyons. Lyons had been working at...
January 22, 2025
A New Look at Our Timeless Past
In 2025, Monterey Jazz will look back at our history and towards the future in a series of posts that reflects our motto, “Timeless Since 1958.” As we have seen many...
July 27, 2023
If Only We Knew! John Handy’s Iconic Monterey Moment
When saxophonist John Handy rolled into the eighth annual Monterey Jazz Festival in 1965, he already knew his new quintet would appear on the Saturday afternoon program in the...
July 17, 2023
Monterey Jazz Festival fashions! Yes, it’s a “thing!”
Come for the music. Come for the enhanced food court and artisan shops. Come for a weekend in Monterey. Come for the fierce fashions! Check out some iconic artists and...
July 11, 2023
The Road to Monterey: A Shared Past, Present and Future with Ambrose Akinmusire and Elena Pinderhughes
MJF frequently highlights musicians who have come through our jazz education programs. Two such artists at MJF66 share a parallel history, both in their past and present –...
July 10, 2023
The Road To Monterey: Setting Course with Herbie Hancock
It may be hard to believe 60 years has passed since the legendary and iconic pianist Herbie Hancock made his debut appearance at the sixth Monterey Jazz Festival on September...
January 12, 2020
The Best of MJF Moments, 2010-2019
Now that the decade has moved on into the “roaring twenties,” there have a been a lot of “best of the 2010s” lists coming out. Looking back at MJF over the decade, we...