Guide for venues and bands in Athens' hot jazz scene

Neoskosmos.com offers a quick glance at venues and bands in the Athenian hot jazz scene in the following report:

"You could be forgiven for thinking that a typical night out in Athens involves, more or less, a dive into the delectable local cuisine, copious wine consumption, and impromptu merriment. This, after all, has been part of the benign stereotype for a while, one that is periodically rekindled as is the case with every cultural stereotype on this planet. Similarly, the usual soundtrack to videos of ancient temples, whitened by time and overlooking the blue black sea has also done its bit to clinch a certain image of Greece as the cradle of all things bouzouki. This is a fine reputation to have and one that comes with a venerable history, but it is not the whole story.

Athens, for instance, is just one of the cities in Greece that has been undergoing a cultural renascence, partly as a remedial response to a crippling crisis, but also as a way of reprocessing these experiences into something creative. Within this cultural and artistic commotion, which over the past year has seen the opening of the eagerly-awaited Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center and the much-discussed Documenta 14, it is easy to miss the city’s shimmering jazz scene and the venues that showcase it.

Yet, a steady trickle of committed musicians over the years has now become a community of top-notch jazz players, diehard enthusiasts and stylish venues that cover a gamut from straight up jazz, jazz-funk, fusion, nu-jazz, ethnic jazz, blues, R&B, and soul – not to mention a steamy mix of live acts in rock, pop, folk and classical. By breathing life into the Greek jazz scene these venues have allowed both veteran and newbie audiences firsthand access to one of the most diverse and addictive musical genres.

Most of the city’s venues fit snugly in the evening-only dive bar category but there is also a fair sprinkling of café bars for midday breaks or after work relaxation.

Late summer is usually a time of transition as some of the urban dives shut or move to their island annexes, so it’s worth consulting the respective venue and band Facebook pages before setting out. However, a mid-August pause aside, there is no shortage of open air events throughout spring, summer and autumn in Athens, semi-impromptu musical get-togethers in pedestrian alleys, squares or at the city’s magical National Gardens. Not to mention the music festivals and gigs all around Greece that are becoming almost too many to count.

Here’s a taste of the scene over the past months through a selection of the city’s finest venues and an introduction to some of the names in Greek jazz worth keeping an ear out for, now, and in the years to come."

Read more here.

RELATED TOPICS: Greece, Greek tourism news, Tourism in Greece, Greek islands, Hotels in Greece, Travel to Greece, Greek destinations , Greek travel market, Greek tourism statistics, Greek tourism report

Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons Copyright:  User:Stannered License: CC-BY-SA

Source: neoskosmos.com