The D’jazz Nevers festival ended on Saturday November 16. Roger Fontanel, its director, looks back on this “very positive” edition.
Roger Fontanel, director of the D’jazz Nevers festival, is satisfied. “The results are very positive. The public responded and was curious.” He estimates he attracted the same number of spectators as last year, “around eight thousand”.
According to a study carried out around ten years ago, the audience of this festival is made up of “75% of Neversois and Nivernais; 20% people from neighboring departments and 5% Parisians and foreigners.”
As for the directors of other festivals, they came from England, Hungary and “many from Belgium”.
Proof of this is that “this festival asserts itself as a meeting point both for the life of this music and for the public”.
An aging audience
Many white heads filled the concert halls.
Our goal is the rejuvenation and renewal of the public.
The director of the D’jazz Nevers festival specifies that the sociology of jazz “has the same problems as that of classical music. The public who discovered jazz in the sixties is aging or disappearing and renewal is not happening as quickly. »
So jazz invites itself into schools, high schools and among students. “It’s long-term daily work. »
Promote exchanges
What delights Roger Fontanel is the importance that this autumn meeting has taken on. “According to Drac, we are in the top five festivals, apart from those on the Côte d’Azur and the big summer machines. »
The aim of that of Nevers is not to generate large revenues but to carry out “a public service mission”. Which was again the case this year according to its creator who wishes to “promote exchanges. At the end of several concerts, I saw people who were enthusiastic and others who didn’t get into it. I see discussions. The crossroads that Nevers has become favors this. A precious crossroads.”
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Another satisfaction: the Jazz Regional Days. “They were very positive both in highlighting the six Burgundian and Normandy teams and in the format. A seated room, a standing room and very fluid circulation. »
The meetings between the musicians were appreciated but “we can still improve them”, recognizes Roger Fontanel who intends to renew “this formula next year”.
The festival renews next year
He is already thinking about the thirty-ninth edition of the D’jazz Nevers festival which will take place from November 8 to 15, 2025. “We are in constant research. Although we are satisfied, we are not resting on our laurels. Nothing is acquired. »
Roger Fontanel is not going to change everything: “We find the same things from one year to the next, such as the calendar, but we must make innovative proposals in order to renew the public”.
A significant event
The highlight of this edition for its director Roger Fontanel is “the Friday evening which brought together two very different groups. The meeting on the same platform of two completely opposite proposals which meets an audience and which provokes debate.
Maxiphone on one side “which offered a show based on the work of Jean-Philippe Rameau followed by the saxo-piano duo of Émile Parisien and Roberto Negro inspired by Ligeti. That’s a big gap between the two. »
Emmanuelle Delaigues
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