For each of the last five years, and in general about 12-13 of the last 18, I've traveled to Montreal with my family on 4th of July weekend. Patriotic, I know, to leave the country by choice, by routine, every Independence Day, but there is a reason for this. That reason is the Festival International de Jazz de Monreal, an Annual 10-day event taking place surrounding Canada's Canada Day and our America Day, and the centerpiece of this near Annual trip to North America's most unique city.
In early years (say 2003 - 2011), these trips were with a lot of various family friends, and I was too young to really enjoy the music (or the festival) aspects. Starting with my trip in 2013 (I've gone that year, plus 2015 - 2019), it slowly transformed to mainly being about hte music as the foundation, with incredible food, beer pubs and the rest to fill it in.
Once again, it may be weird to take the same trip over and over again, but for a family (and this is generally a family trip) that travels as much as we do (mostly independently at this point) there is some stunning serenity in taking a trip where we don't have to plan too much. We hit more or less the same restaurants (it helps that dinner is usually at the festival), I increasingly-more-willingly drag my parents to the same brew-pubs. I go to the same crepe restaurant each morning. Same-ness is fine at times.
Of course, the one difference is the music, the rotating cavalcade of artists, none of them huge, nearly all gifted, good enough to perform at the world's largest Jazz Festival, not famous enough to warrant paid indoor shows. The Jazz Festival has its share of those (indoor shows), with this year such names as Peter Frampton and CHVRCHS, but overall it is the atmosphere of these outdoor shows that make it so special.
The festival is housed around the Quartieres des Spectacles - a large area right in the heart of the city. Over the years, they've beefed up this area of land from various make-shift outdoor stages built on top of grass and dirt to a full-fledged spectacle area, well built for these shows. Over the years, the placement of the stages change, a small thing that shouldn't matter, but when you go every year beacuse you expect routine, you get slightly irked by these things.
The festival is about Jazz in name only. There are a lot of Jazz acts (especially the paid shows), including mane hardcore jazz quintets or trios or quartets and the like. But over time the festival has shifted to include a lot of Blues, R&B, afro-beat, asian and middle-eastern stylings, classic singer-songwriter performances, song and dance men and the rest. This variety, howeer, has just added to the fun.
The main parts of the festival are a series of shows each day (it lasts ~10 days) from about 5pm to Midnight, at the series of stages. There's the stage that has mostly hardcore blues, there's the stage with more general singing, there's the stage with strange music from various ethnicities, and then their showcase stage that has more mass-appeal music. Not all are great, almost all are certainly good enough.
Over the years, the festival has added plenty of little touches to make it more user-friendly. There was the addition of the Lounge Heineken stage, a more intimate setting for smaller shows (Heineken, by the way, is sadly the main beer sponsor). There was teh addition of a New Orleans-style stage fit with food stalls selling classic bayou fare. Of course, what really makes this weekend annual excursion isn't the music - though it is great in total - it is everything else about Montreal.
First the food, which is an ever-expanding list of highly curated favorites. Schwartz is probably the most enduring, an annual ritual for almost all of the eighteen years we've been coming here. Their famous smoked meat has never disappointed - even as they 'corporatized' with opening a second takeout only location. That hasn't at all worsened the food - just made the lines more bearable.
Other spots are Robin Square, a fully family owned restaurant where Momma and Pappa are teh cooks, and the kids are the wait staff and sous chefs and all the rest. The food is pristine, even their generally reduced lunch menu. This time we tried a new place in Caribou Gourmand, which had a few 'only in Canada' classics like Deer Ribs (one of the best Ribs I've tasted), and a Seal appetizer. There's places in the past we went to that we didn't this time in Bouillon Bilk and Pyrenees, two fairly simple, refined, European inspired spots. The food in Montreal is consistently great, even if we expand the list of places we've been to ever so slowly.
The brewpubs come next. The most frequent has been NYKS, a dimly-lit dive bar, except it has a great view of the Quartieres des Spectacles, a place that has often been our host to our nightcap. A couple years back, we extended outwards. First was Le Saint Bock, a brewpub on St. Denis (one of the more hip streets in Montreal proper) with its own brew list combined with a great rotating tap list. It has outdoor seating which we usually jump on, a great people watching spot that has given us a view of some pretty interesting nights. Finally, two years back, I added Dieu du Ciel, a dimly lit craft brewery in the Mile End area of Montreal. They have a great tap list, and the place gets crowded around ten and only more crowded way past one (people are coming in when we generally leave, and again this is a standard brew pub). Montreal is truly a great city even if you are just spending time with family.
Montreal is a great city - I'm pretty sure I ranked it #1 on my list of US & Canada cities, and part of that is because I've just spent more time there than other cities. But the reason we keep coming back, the reason we are fine going to the same place year after year is because of how special it is. How consistently great the music and atmosphere is at the festival, sure, but more than that. The consistency of the restaurants, the cosnistency of the brews, the fact that we can just turn our minds off, both during the long weekend and planning around it.
This was the 40th year of the Jazz Festival. By that math, our first year would have been the 24th (2003). I distinctly remember the 30th in 2009, the year I graduated high school. It was probably the first year I truly remember my experience at the festival being about the music. It is crazy we've come here year after year, and while in the beginning we missed a few years, in recent times it's become more and more of a staple. I've missed a lot of parties with friends and cookouts back home for this, and I wouldn't miss Montreal for the world. Hopefully we'll never have to stop coming for this annual weekend of pure bliss.
In early years (say 2003 - 2011), these trips were with a lot of various family friends, and I was too young to really enjoy the music (or the festival) aspects. Starting with my trip in 2013 (I've gone that year, plus 2015 - 2019), it slowly transformed to mainly being about hte music as the foundation, with incredible food, beer pubs and the rest to fill it in.
Once again, it may be weird to take the same trip over and over again, but for a family (and this is generally a family trip) that travels as much as we do (mostly independently at this point) there is some stunning serenity in taking a trip where we don't have to plan too much. We hit more or less the same restaurants (it helps that dinner is usually at the festival), I increasingly-more-willingly drag my parents to the same brew-pubs. I go to the same crepe restaurant each morning. Same-ness is fine at times.
Of course, the one difference is the music, the rotating cavalcade of artists, none of them huge, nearly all gifted, good enough to perform at the world's largest Jazz Festival, not famous enough to warrant paid indoor shows. The Jazz Festival has its share of those (indoor shows), with this year such names as Peter Frampton and CHVRCHS, but overall it is the atmosphere of these outdoor shows that make it so special.
The festival is housed around the Quartieres des Spectacles - a large area right in the heart of the city. Over the years, they've beefed up this area of land from various make-shift outdoor stages built on top of grass and dirt to a full-fledged spectacle area, well built for these shows. Over the years, the placement of the stages change, a small thing that shouldn't matter, but when you go every year beacuse you expect routine, you get slightly irked by these things.
The festival is about Jazz in name only. There are a lot of Jazz acts (especially the paid shows), including mane hardcore jazz quintets or trios or quartets and the like. But over time the festival has shifted to include a lot of Blues, R&B, afro-beat, asian and middle-eastern stylings, classic singer-songwriter performances, song and dance men and the rest. This variety, howeer, has just added to the fun.
The main parts of the festival are a series of shows each day (it lasts ~10 days) from about 5pm to Midnight, at the series of stages. There's the stage that has mostly hardcore blues, there's the stage with more general singing, there's the stage with strange music from various ethnicities, and then their showcase stage that has more mass-appeal music. Not all are great, almost all are certainly good enough.
Over the years, the festival has added plenty of little touches to make it more user-friendly. There was the addition of the Lounge Heineken stage, a more intimate setting for smaller shows (Heineken, by the way, is sadly the main beer sponsor). There was teh addition of a New Orleans-style stage fit with food stalls selling classic bayou fare. Of course, what really makes this weekend annual excursion isn't the music - though it is great in total - it is everything else about Montreal.
First the food, which is an ever-expanding list of highly curated favorites. Schwartz is probably the most enduring, an annual ritual for almost all of the eighteen years we've been coming here. Their famous smoked meat has never disappointed - even as they 'corporatized' with opening a second takeout only location. That hasn't at all worsened the food - just made the lines more bearable.
Other spots are Robin Square, a fully family owned restaurant where Momma and Pappa are teh cooks, and the kids are the wait staff and sous chefs and all the rest. The food is pristine, even their generally reduced lunch menu. This time we tried a new place in Caribou Gourmand, which had a few 'only in Canada' classics like Deer Ribs (one of the best Ribs I've tasted), and a Seal appetizer. There's places in the past we went to that we didn't this time in Bouillon Bilk and Pyrenees, two fairly simple, refined, European inspired spots. The food in Montreal is consistently great, even if we expand the list of places we've been to ever so slowly.
The brewpubs come next. The most frequent has been NYKS, a dimly-lit dive bar, except it has a great view of the Quartieres des Spectacles, a place that has often been our host to our nightcap. A couple years back, we extended outwards. First was Le Saint Bock, a brewpub on St. Denis (one of the more hip streets in Montreal proper) with its own brew list combined with a great rotating tap list. It has outdoor seating which we usually jump on, a great people watching spot that has given us a view of some pretty interesting nights. Finally, two years back, I added Dieu du Ciel, a dimly lit craft brewery in the Mile End area of Montreal. They have a great tap list, and the place gets crowded around ten and only more crowded way past one (people are coming in when we generally leave, and again this is a standard brew pub). Montreal is truly a great city even if you are just spending time with family.
Montreal is a great city - I'm pretty sure I ranked it #1 on my list of US & Canada cities, and part of that is because I've just spent more time there than other cities. But the reason we keep coming back, the reason we are fine going to the same place year after year is because of how special it is. How consistently great the music and atmosphere is at the festival, sure, but more than that. The consistency of the restaurants, the cosnistency of the brews, the fact that we can just turn our minds off, both during the long weekend and planning around it.
This was the 40th year of the Jazz Festival. By that math, our first year would have been the 24th (2003). I distinctly remember the 30th in 2009, the year I graduated high school. It was probably the first year I truly remember my experience at the festival being about the music. It is crazy we've come here year after year, and while in the beginning we missed a few years, in recent times it's become more and more of a staple. I've missed a lot of parties with friends and cookouts back home for this, and I wouldn't miss Montreal for the world. Hopefully we'll never have to stop coming for this annual weekend of pure bliss.
