At a glance
Opening hours
17 October to 4 November 2025
The NUEJAZZ Festival in Nuremberg counts as one of the most innovative jazz festivals in Germany and was awarded with the German Jazz Prize 2024 as “Festival of the Year”. With a courageous and cross-genre program, it brings national and international stars and exciting newcomers to the stage each year. With its creative and high-quality program design and the support of young talent, the NUEJAZZ Festival sets impulses for the jazz scene in Germany and beyond.
The Story: “We Are Sexier Than a Normal Jazz Festival”
Since its founding in 2013, the NUEJAZZ Festival has established itself at one of the most exciting and successful points of contact for modern jazz. Each year it brings a mix of international newcomers on the stage and widens the borders of the genre. Nuremberg, known for its long jazz tradition – the Jazz Studio Nuremberg is one of the oldest and most respected jazz addresses in Germany – had no festival of this type before NUEJAZZ. NUEJAZZ fills this gap and gives the city a platform for innovative jazz, which often integrates electronic sounds, hip-hop beats and creative experiments. The festival was brought to life by Frank Wuppinger and Marco Kühnl, who organize it until today. Locations like the Kulturwerkstatt auf AEG, the Z-Bau – which Wuppinger describes as “modern opera” – and the E-Werk contribute their industrial charm to the festival’s unique atmosphere.
The Music: Modern & Cross Genre
The NUEJAZZ Festival stands for a one-of-a-kind musical journey. Jazz is not just a fixed style for the festival, but a lively, always developing and changing music form, which overcomes cultural and social borders and is the basis of many other music styles. Fed from blues and the pain of slavery, jazz is, above all, full of stories, which also speak of injustice and marginalization. Therefore it requires not only musicians who have mastered their skills, but those who also have a deeper story to tell. “We want to elucidate, represent, pull people along and give the artists a voice and a place to do so”, as the vision behind the festival.
Prof. Dr. Max Ackermann: “For me, this is one of the nicest festival that I have visited in my life. Especially because it is imbued with design. One notices how much love is hidden in the details.”
Prof. Rainer Kotzian: “When you look at the audience, you immediately recognize the diversity there. Young to old to middle and from everywhere. What I find particularly impressive – and what in the end is also a new field of experimentation and learning – is the variety of the program. There’s something for every age here.”
Maike, aged 34: “Here, modern jazz meets electronic beats and creative experimentation. It’s always exciting to experience something new.”
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