Yokohama Jazz Promenade

Yokohama · JP

Running since 1993, Yokohama Jazz Promenade is Japan's best known city wide jazz festival and describes itself as a participatory one, built together by musicians, audiences, volunteers and the city. Over one October weekend the music spreads from concert halls to jazz clubs, street corners, parks and shopping arcades across Yokohama, with 2026 bookings including the Fumio Itabashi Jazz Orchestra, a Junko Onishi special quartet, the Riyoko Takagi Trio, the Yukko Miller Group, the Tetsuo Sakurai Band and a collaboration band invited from Taiwan. The 2026 edition is on 10 and 11 October, and the executive committee is chaired by writer Robert Harris. The festival holds a genuine open call every year for its street stage bands, with the 2026 window having run 1 to 15 June and now closed. It is a real route in, but a demanding one from abroad: applicants download an entry sheet and email it to the festival's programme address, slots are allocated by lot rather than by selection, there is a per performer fee, and attendance at an in person performers briefing in Yokohama, held on 10 September 2026 for that year, is mandatory for a band representative or the slot is forfeited. General enquiries go to a general address, which the site prints with a star in place of the at sign.