North Sea Jazz Festival and Happy Birthday Anna!!!

Hey Everyone!

As some of you may or may not know, one of the main reasons for us going on this trip to Europe was to check out the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam at the massive Ahoy complex! And it so happened that the festival coincided with Anna's 24th Birthday on the 14th of July! It was a nice birthday present for her, as is this entire trip! Robins family made it a special day too, giving Anna birthday cake and presents! A special thanks to them for making it such a lovely day.

We had heard so many stories about the festival from lots of different people, and one of the main things everyone mentioned was the hugeness of it all...and they weren't wrong! The Ahoy complex houses huge auditoriums that are perfect for big concerts, and also houses some more intimate venues for quieter concerts.

The big concerts were heald on the Nile stage (all the stages were named after rivers eg: Nile, Amazon, Maas, Hudson, Murray etc.). On the Nile stage we saw acts like Steely Dan, Steps Ahead, Joe Zawinul Syndicate, Mike Stern band, India.Arie, Maceo Parker and Sly and the Family Stone! As you can see we spent most of our time here!

Next door was the Maas stage, which was also very big. Here we saw Randy Brecker's Electric Band, Reunion feat Chuck Loeb Eric Marienthal and Dennis Chambers, and an amazing singer/guitarist Raul Midon who's also blind...his albums sold out at the festival!

The Hudson stage was suited for more intimate performances. Here we saw McCoy Tyner with Gary Bartz, Dave Sanborn with Marcus Miller, Joe Lovano, and Josh Redman trio.

Most of the time it was very hard to decide which stage we were going to. We knew it was going to be big, but it was much bigger than our expectations. On Saturday alone there were 75,000 people who bought tickets! So some advice...if you love jazz and good music this is a great weekend, but if you're not that keen on huge crowds maybe think twice! But for us, it was most definately worth it! It's the kind of thing that you have to do at least once if you're into jazz. It's a great way to see all the amazing musicians you love all in the one place!

This was the last thing we did in The Netherlands before leaving for Italy so we were sad that it was over for more than one reason. It was great to spend time with our good friends Emilie and Robin and meet their familes and pets! Hopefully they will come down under again soon! A big thanks again to them for making our stay in The Netherlands so wonderful, it's a very beautiful country and you made easy to appreciate!

Love to everyone.

Anna and Michael xox

P.S. Pics of the festival are coming soon.