Twelve years ago, Red Light Jazz began as an initiative of local entrepreneurs in the Red Light District. Not a subsidy project from above, but an idea from people who work and live in the neighborhood every day. The goal was simple: to revive the rich jazz history of this neighborhood. The thirteenth edition will take place in 2026, from Friday, June 5 to Sunday, June 7. Three days, dozens of performances, one neighborhood.
The names on the bill show that Red Light Jazz is looking beyond the Dutch scene. Sabrina Starke is on hand, as is the duo Hermine Deurloo & Anton Goudsmit. Samora Pinderhughes comes over from the U.S., and Ella Zirina adds another color to the program. Zuco 103 and Likeminds complete a lineup that goes from smooth to edgy. All of them artists who know what they are doing on a stage.
What's special about Red Light Jazz is not just who is playing, but where. The Sint-Olofskapel, Jazzcafé Casablanca on the Zeedijk, Casa Rosso, Hotel Prins Hendrik, the Corps Hall of the Salvation Army and the Waalse Kerk: the whole neighborhood becomes stage. No festival site with fences around it, but music that runs right through the streets of the Red Light District. Moreover, the venues have their own history. Chet Baker played here. Kid Dynamite, the Amsterdam saxophonist Lodewijk Rudolf Arthur Parisius, was a regular fixture here. That past is in the stones, and Red Light Jazz handles it consciously.
The Red Light District becomes a stage for three days, from the Seafront to St. Olaf's Chapel, and it works every time.
Red Light Jazz is supported by the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts and is a member of the Association of Dutch Jazz Venues and Jazz Festivals. This gives the festival a solid foundation, but the character remains local. Residents, business owners and visitors walk the same route, listen to the same music, sit together in a chapel that is just a chapel during the day. The Red Light District as a concert venue: it works every time.