Edinburgh Jazz Festival, Jazz and blues, Jazz

Songs For An Airless Room styles itself as somewhere between theatre and a piece of music to be performed. If this is fairly grandiose and self-regarding it nevertheless is an ambitious collaboration between live musical performance and screened film.

The annual Edinburgh Jazz and Blues festival runs the gamut of jazz persuasions from more traditional Dixie and ragtime bands to up-and-coming stars, from big band concerts to pub jams. It comes a month after the Edinburgh International Film Festival and gets the August Festivals season going.

The Edinburgh International Festival may have come first, but generally it's the Fringe that Edinburgh is best-known for. There's really nothing quite like it: "the largest show on Earth" they say. The latest stats seem to bear that out: the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2009 saw 34,265 performances of 2,098 shows at 265 venues. It's a sprawling, anarchic, sleepless month of live performances.

A vibrant mix of jazz and big band pieces from inspiring ensemble of young musicians. Free.

A curious double bill for this midweek gig.  It seems churlish to describe Sweet Billy Pilgrim as the “support act”, particularly as how their recent “Twice Born Men” album was nominated for this year's Mercury Music Award. 

Brought to Edinburgh by members of North Carolina theatre and performance troupe Concrete Generation, this was an impressionistic wander through the lives of two of the most inspirational, and aesthetically controversial, figures in American 20th century jazz: Miles Davis and John Coltrane.

At  9.50pm on a Sunday night, I join the queue snaking from the archway of the Assembly Hall, round the corner up the Mound almost to the High Street.  Camille, the Celtic Queen of Cabaret is back in town following sell out seasons in London, New York and Sydney. From her Edinburgh debut in Le Cirque in 2003, and her award winning Spiegeltent show in 2007, it's been a long journey for this French-Irish architect from Cork who literally ran away with the Circus to be a global musical star.

Most people will remember the Blues Brothers from the eponymous 1980 film and fans will have longed to do two things.  Attend a Blues Brothers gig and throw their car's cigarette lighter out the window.

In recent years, criticisms could be levelled against the Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival for being overly steeped in traditionalism. While the event remained a cornerstone of Edinburgh's summer festivals, and continued to gain good audience figures, there was little indication of the potentially revolutionary sounds on offer within the jazz spectrum.

Fingers crossed the weather man will provide a sunny day to accompany the Edinburgh Jazz & Blues Festival's

The free Mardi Gras, part of the Edinburgh Jazz Festival, launches Edinburgh's Festival season with its customar

Few cities undergo such a transformation as Scotland's capital city in the month of August.

The normally easy-going, historic city suddenly jolts to life as thousands of actors, artists,

The Edinburgh Jazz Festival is to receive £49,370 from the Scottish Government's Edinburgh Festivals Expo Fund for an annual Scottish Jazz Expo.

Annual festival, organised by the Clarsach Society (Comunn na Clàrsaich), that has now been running for over a quarter century.

Billed as "Frank, Sammy and Dean, The Rat Pack - Live from Las Vegas" this is a glamorous recreation of a show at the Sands Theatre, Las Vegas in the 1960s.

North Sea Gas have struck gold again with a new show and new album Rosslyn. After a hectic three week Fringe schedule I arrived at the Acoustic Music Centre rather tired, footsore and weary. Ten minutes later I was singing, clapping and stomping along

The audience came expecting to enjoy themselves and were not disappointed. The show, comprising archive Lyttelton, traditional jazz, music from the current Cornucopia album and new material from Cornucopia 2 (due for release at the end of the August), was varied, slick, vibrant and fun.

As always, Scotland's King of Swing, Craig McMurdo, delivered a fantastic evening of entertainment. The atmosphere was electric as the audience anticipated what

The sun was shining down on the 29th Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival as speeches by Michael Hart (Festival Director) and Bruce Fallon (Chairman EJBF) opened proceedings on Saturday.