Montreux Jasmine

The Paczki Principle

An exotic, floral perfume scent
Just like the jasmine flower with a bit of vanilla

For years, the Montreux-Detroit International Jazz Festival held a place of distinction as one of the largest free jazz festivals in the world. Borne in an era of civic optimism and generous funding, the annual Labor-Day weekend event at Hart Plaza drew thousands annually to hear jazz greats from the Motor City and beyond, but its future was a bit tenuous after it celebrated its 25th year in 2004.

Like the city itself, the Montreux Jazz Fest has had a financially shaky, peripatetically focused, but impressively generous-of-spirit history. The inaugural event, in 1980, came thanks to Detroit Renaissance, a private, non-profit group of local business minds committed to improving the city's fortunes. The festival linked Detroit with the Swiss resort town of Montreux, which had hosted an annual jazz festival every summer since 1967 on the shores of Lake Geneva. Music Hall Center for the Performing Arts took over production in 1994, and the Montreux link ended in 2000, after Swiss organizers demanded a hefty fee for use of its name.

At that point, the Motown event became the Ford Detroit International Jazz Festival. An attempt to increase attendance with the somewhat controversial inclusion of non-jazz acts in recent years drew the ire of jazz purists. Still the red ink didn't disappear, and Ford made the decision to end its support.

Enter Mack Avenue Records, a jazz label based in Grosse Pointe. It just so happens that Mack Avenue CEO Gretchen Valade was also a member of the Board of Directors of Music Hall. A sponsor of previous festivals, she couldn't bear to see them end and so increased her company's support substantially.

In the early years under the Montreux banner, events took place all over downtown. Besides the free concerts at Hart Plaza, there were ticketed concerts at the State Theatre, Book Cadillac Hotel, Pontchartrain Hotel and the Renaissance Center. One particularly popular event was the RAPA House Jam Sessions. Named for the Rodgers family's legendary performing arts academy/concert café on E. Vernor of the 50s, the Montreux RAPA House often attracted headliners from the festival for a late night, impromptu jam.

And the beat goes on.

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