Glasgow Jazz Festival 2025: How Glasgow is becoming a Jazz hotspot

The Jazz Festival has hosted some of the genre’s biggest names, Miles Davis played in 1990 as the city was the European Capital of Culture, Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Petersen and Ray Charles played the festival in just its second year in 1988.

However, as it kicks off its 39th edition, there is a feeling that it is taking place in a city where the genre is feeling true, homegrown authenticity.

Dorian Cloudsley is a member of Glasgow jazz outfit Fat Suit. Described as “somewhere between a band and a collective”, their rotating line up of members is common among the city’s groups.

“We have certain core members from the beginning, but the rest are made up by a couple of people sharing a position, or they'll come and go over the years. A lot of these players, including these younger players that are really breaking through, spend time playing with us as well, often when they were really young,” Dorian explained. “It's so cool to just see their development and how they've come through and what they've gone on to do.”

One of those who passed through the Fat Suit collective is Liam Shorthall, better known as corto.alto. He is the latest musician to burst on to the scene and gain mainstream prominence. His 2023 debut album Bad With Names was shortlisted for the Mercury Prize in 2024.

“I've known Liam for a long time. He's such a talented, hard working guy, and he's just been doing his thing for a long time. It's like it's starting to break through now,” Dorian said. “But on this side of the scene, it's like he's just doing what he's always been doing, and it's an amazingly high level, and it's starting to break through.”

Shorthall is a by-product of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland’s undergraduate jazz programme. After enrolling at just 16 years old, he became its youngest ever graduate. The course, Dorian said, led to an infusion of young talent in the city.

Fat Suit however formed 12 years ago at Strathclyde University and Dorian said that the scene in the city has moved on from those days where it was dominated by a perception of a more old school approach to the genre - an approach that he acknowledged is still important.

These days however, Dorian said the genre has merged with two, almost diametrically opposed, scenes in club culture and folk.

“There's so much crossover, and we've been kind of part of that as well, those sorts of genre crossings, which has helped to present it to new audiences and keep it fresh, and I think find new ways to explore it. I feel like, as we've sort of come of age, we have seen the jazz scene strengthen here so much, and it just feels so much deeper now than like, a decade ago,” Dorian said.

It’s something that India Blue from Azamiah agrees with, and that diversification of jazz is part of what is keeping the genre progressing in the city.

“I think that to keep a genre exciting, you kind of have to let it evolve and move with the times. And I feel like that's going to come with people's perceptions changing about things, and culture shifting, and diversity becoming more prevalent in cities and in the world, and I feel like that's only going to naturally change,” she explained.

The increased interest is not just limited to Glasgow though, Ezra Collective won the Mercury Prize in 2023 and were the first jazz group to win the Brit Award for Group of the Year in earlier this year. It all points to a renaissance for a genre that perhaps once suffered from a stuffy reputation.

I think that's only good for everyone in the UK that's doing jazz. It's amazing what Mama Terra and corto.alto are doing representing Scotland. And I really, really want to be part of that as well. And I guess I am. I just maybe to, like, not the same degree just yet,” India said.

With jazz in Glasgow seemingly on the up, is there a positive outlook ahead for the genre in the city? Dorian thinks there is real scope for optimism around the city.

“I think the optimistic side is that the talent, it's great, the creativity is great. And the conditions here are such that there's venues where people can play, there's venues where people can go see their friends play. There's jams, there are conditions for creativity, which is brilliant,” there is however a but, according to Dorian. “What Glasgow lacks is more of an infrastructure. Because I think the bands that really come out and come through are the acts that manage to transcend the scene.

“Like, again, the examples we just talked about, they get recognised by the London press, or they get recognised by European press, and they get to tour outside, and then that gives them their next sort of layer of legitimacy.”

For India, who is originally from London but has been playing in Glasgow for four years, she believes there is an opportunity for the city to become a go-to place for the genre.

“I think it's going very, very exciting places. There's more and more amazing talent emerging in Glasgow and Scotland generally within the world of jazz. And I feel like it's only going to be allowing us as a city, of us as musicians in the city, to be gaining more, building more audiences, reaching out internationally to new places, to new audiences. And I hope, and I actually do see it becoming somewhere that people will like travel to, like they do to London to come and see these renowned musicians,” India said.

Where Dorian and India do perhaps disagree is on whether or not the infrastructure is fully there for the scene to flourish.

“It's a question of can we have more sort of mid-sized venues. You know, we have small venues, and then we have absolutely massive venues for big touring artists to come through, but these kinds of medium sized ones people can really aim towards,” Dorian said.

For India though, there are still plenty of areas to be explored.

I think it's actually really exciting how there are new venues popping up. Obviously, I know it's such a shame that a lot of them have closed in the past few years, maybe as a result of COVID and other financial burdens, but you know, we've got the Marlborough we've got the Rum Shack, the Glad Cafe, all these exciting venues popping up in the Southside as well, kind of facilitating the growth of the jazz scene and showcasing the growth of the jazz scene,” India said

“I guess, in essence, I feel like it's definitely something that could be better, but I feel like there's so many places that I still want to play in Glasgow.”

Glasgow Jazz Festival runs between 18-22 June. You can find out more here.