Concertation of concerts
The Montreux Jazz offers live concerts on its YouTube channel
Each year, more concerts are visible through streaming. The festival thus increases its influence with young people, without preteritating its ticket office.
Chaka Khan announced on the networks the broadcast of his live concert, which increases the influence of the festival.
KEYSTONE
- The Montreux Jazz Festival now broadcasts part of its live concerts on YouTube.
- Seventeen artists agreed to share their performance in global streaming.
- Directors-musicians capture the essence of concerts for the digital format.
- This initiative mainly targets an international audience aged 15 to 34.
Quincy Jones, who died last November, was well worth a global retransmission of the tribute that several artists paid him on Friday evening at the opening of the Montreux Jazz Festival (Mjf), with Chaka Khan As a mistress of ceremonies, which at the same time celebrated his 50 years of career. What many people ignore is that it was not necessarily necessary to be there, in front of the lake stage, to taste the event. The most informed will have followed the concert on their balcony, in their living room, two steps or at the other end of the world.
A historical heritage
This concert was indeed the first in the 2025 edition to be broadcast live, in “live streaming”, on the MJF Youtube channel. On Saturday, Trueno and J Balvin benefited from the same treatment to broadcast Rap and Reggaeton far beyond the banks of Lake Geneva. “The capture of concerts has been part of the Festival DNA since its beginnings,” recalls the media manager Eduardo Mendez. The festival has also put all its history in archives, and digitized more than half a century of moments of anthology (which has never seen the legendary performance of Nina Simone in 1976?).
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Filming for history is one thing. Broadcasting live is another, and the biggest events, such as the Coachella Festival, or Glastonbury, are followed live worldwide. “Our films were recognized far away, but today we have decided for a few years to also offer this formula to artists,” adds Eduardo Mendez.
The Montreux Jazz Festival visible on networks
The first broadcasts took place in 2021, and the number of interested musicians increased each year. For this edition, 17 have already signed to try the experience. “They announce on their networks that their concert will be visible live, as Chaka Khan has done,” specifies Nicolas Bonard, director of Montreux Media Ventures (MMV), the company that produces and distributes this content. J Balvin has 50 million followers on Instagram, which considerably amplifies the influence of the festival. ”
Twenty of the thirty concerts scheduled this year on the lake scene will be broadcast live in streaming on the YouTube channel of Montreux Jazz Festival.
KEYSTONE
MMV teams are made up of young directors who are also musicians, in order to grasp the soul of a concert, a singer, and to anticipate what can happen in this report in total immersion. “We no longer film for TV, but really for digital and smartphones, with a special grain,” adds Nicolas Bonard. The primary goal is not archiving, even if each evening the images are stored on the festival servers, sent directly by fiber optic.
J Balvin (here in Quebec in 2024) broadcast his concert on Saturday on the MJF Youtube channel live.
XCXFLANIGANX IMAGO/ZUMA PRESS WIRE
The marketing comes second, when it comes to distributing these filmed concerts, in audio, digital or vinyl formats, or in audiovisual on platforms. “The rights are negotiated upstream with the majors, such as Universal, BMG or Mercure Studios, and in office also what the artist wishes, delighted to be offered an artistic and commercial product, because the record companies make less and less concertation captures,” underlines Nicolas Bonard.
Public aged 15 to 34
There is no cannibalization with the ticket office, says Nicolas Bonard: “The public comes to Montreux for a concert experience, and streamings are intended above all for an audience aged 15 to 34, mainly in the United States, the United Kingdom and Germany, while Switzerland arrives in 4e position.” Objective: to reach a new audience, internationally.
The cast of a remake of the cabbage soup? No: The Inspector Cluzo. The Landes group will be on the lake stage on Sunday July 6, and live on Youtube.
DR
This year, 17 artists have played the game. The discussions are still underway with record companies for three additional names, which will be revealed soon. In total, 20 concerts out of the 30 programmed on the lake stage will be visible live on your mobile phone. It will thus be possible to see Alanis Morissette on July 19 either on site or on YouTube, The Black Keys on the 17th, or Benson Boone on the 15th.
www.youtube.com/@MontreuxJazzFest
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