For half a century, Jazz Juniors has been helping shape the history of Polish, European and global jazz. Since 1976, Jazz Juniors has been a place where paths of young, talented musicians cross, where artists shaping the voice of their generation meet, and where bridges are built between successive generations of jazz practitioners.
From the very beginning, the festival and competition have looked towards the future — towards new, creative directions and the youthful spirit of bold, sometimes risky, but always authentic exploration. Over five decades, musical languages, aesthetics and generations of artists have changed. What has remained constant, however, is the desire to discover what is yet to come.
This year’s edition of Jazz Juniors will be another chapter in this story — a meeting of young creators with artists who have already made their mark on the face of contemporary jazz. The festival programme will combine the energy and freshness of new performers with concerts by established musicians, as well as events offering different perspectives on what jazz means today.
01.10.2026, 7:00 PM
Cricoteka, 2–4 Nadwiślańska Street
FREE ADMISSION
Finals of the Jazz Juniors Competition — 50th Edition
The fifty-year history of Jazz Juniors has been built around competitive encounters between musicians from Poland and around the world. For decades, the auditions have revealed talents who, through their participation in the festival, have had the opportunity to shine on stages across the globe. For not all artists, prizes and podium places have proved to be the most important thing. Often, simply taking part in Jazz Juniors has been an experience that influenced the further course of their artistic journey — opening up new opportunities, initiating important encounters and giving them their first chance to appear before a wider audience.
The 50th edition of the festival will not be a revolution — it will be a continuation. Remembering that bands and artists such as Tie Break, Miłość and Marcin Wasilewski’s trio first made their mark on the Jazz Juniors competition stage, and that subsequent editions have featured outstanding improvisers from successive generations of the European scene, it is worth taking a seat once again at Cricoteka and listening to what is only just emerging on the horizon of the history of improvised music.
Perhaps this is where another important story will begin — in keeping with the motto “The Future Is Today.”
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02.10.2026, 7:00 PM
Cricoteka, 2–4 Nadwiślańska Street
Miki Yui feat. Nils Petter Molvær
Øyunn
For years, the festival stage has been a meeting place for diverse influences and inspirations, often reaching beyond orthodox definitions of jazz. This is not about crossing boundaries for the sake of crossing them, however, but about jazz understood as openness, curiosity and a willingness to explore.
The first concert evening of the 50th edition of Jazz Juniors will belong to two artists who consistently speak with their own voices on stage. Japanese artist Miki Yui and Norwegian artist Øyunn move through very different musical territories, yet they share a particular kind of sensitivity — subtlety and an ability to build tension without resorting to obvious means. The audience can
therefore expect two entirely different concerts, connected not by style but by a way of thinking about music.
Miki Yui creates music from minimalist forms in which every detail matters. Samples, electronic noise and delicate sonic textures come together to form a melancholic, spacious narrative. During this part of the evening, the artist will be joined as a special guest by Nils Petter Molvær, Artistic Director of Jazz Juniors.
Øyunn, meanwhile, moves closer to the world of song — filtered through the experiences of alternative music and jazz. Her music is more direct, but no less layered. It contains rhythm, experimentation and pop accessibility, but above all, emotions that will be difficult to remain indifferent to.
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03.10.2026, 7:00 PM
Cricoteka, 2–4 Nadwiślańska Street
EABS
Piotr Orzechowski “Pianohooligan”
The second concert evening of the anniversary edition of Jazz Juniors will present two completely different approaches to engaging with the jazz tradition. EABS and Piotr “Pianohooligan” Orzechowski explore musical territories far removed from one another, each challenging, in their own way, our preconceptions about what jazz is.
The EABS group has been active on the scene for fifteen years, consistently developing its own musical language at the intersection of jazz, hip-hop, electronic music and techno. For them, the history of music is not so much a collection of monuments as material to be used and placed in new contexts. Their repertoire combines original compositions with works by Krzysztof Komeda, Sun Ra, Tomasz Stańko and Zbigniew Seifert, while their albums have featured guest appearances by, among others, Michał Urbaniak and Jan Ptaszyn Wróblewski.
On stage, EABS mixes these ingredients and distils them into music of enormous energy — a contemporary take on fusion in which the jazz tradition meets the rhythms of club culture.
Piotr Orzechowski “Pianohooligan” takes a different path. His music grows out of an extraordinary attentiveness to habits and established ways of listening. Rather than confirming what audiences already know and expect, Orzechowski prefers to return to the sources and see what else can be drawn from them.
His approach is a form of artistic experimentation directed both against the performer’s own limitations and against the expectations of the audience. While EABS brings the jazz tradition into the realm of contemporary popular culture, “Pianohooligan” examines it up close, exploring how it can still be interpreted.
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04.10.2026, 7:00 PM
Krakow Philharmonic, 1 Zwierzyniecka Street
Winners’ Concert
Nils Petter Molvær & Alva Noto
The first part of the closing evening of the 50th edition of Jazz Juniors will be another chapter in the festival’s long-standing tradition of winners’ performances. The stage of the Krakow Philharmonic will welcome those finalists whose vision of music wins over the festival jury.
They will bring the competition element of the anniversary edition to a close, while their performance will also mark the beginning of another chapter. The history of Jazz Juniors has repeatedly shown that discoveries made through the competition can eventually reach far beyond the festival stage. Perhaps this year’s winners will include artists whose names, in just a few years’ time, will become well known to audiences.
In the second part of the evening, the audience will witness a meeting between two exceptional personalities of the experimental music scene — Norwegian trumpeter and composer, and Artistic Director of Jazz Juniors, Nils Petter Molvær, and German artist and producer Alva Noto.
Their music emerges at the intersection of improvisation, jazz, ambient music and precise electronic production. Alva Noto’s spacious, minimalist sound meets Molvær’s distinctive, often processed trumpet, creating music that is intense, hypnotic and resistant to simple genre classifications.
It is a dialogue between two worlds — the organic and the electronic, meticulously planned structures and free improvisation. At the same time, it is a meeting of artists who have spent years demonstrating that jazz can exist beyond rigid genre boundaries while remaining music that is alive, open and unpredictable.
The finale of the 50th edition of Jazz Juniors will thus bring together two points in the same story: young musicians who are only just beginning their own journeys, and artists who have spent years blazing trails for others. Between them remains what has mattered most for half a century — curiosity about what comes next.
The competition
The finalists of the 50th edition of the Jazz Juniors Competition have been announced! A record number of entries and an international jury for the anniversary edition. The event kicks off on 1 October in Krakow.
A major celebration of jazz in Krakow is just around the corner. The organisers have announced the results of the call for entries for the Jazz Juniors Competition. The anniversary, 50th edition attracted a record number of submissions — more than 50 bands and solo artists from around the world competed for the opportunity to perform before an international jury during the competition finals.
After carefully reviewing the submitted materials, the jury selected six finalists who will perform before the Krakow audience on 1 October 2026 at Cricoteka. The finalists include bands and solo artists from Poland and abroad: Contraphonic (Łódź), Małgorzata Hoppe (Gdańsk), Quietet (Krakow), Glass Quintet (Wrocław), Hvmble (Warsaw), and Men In Love Run Hard (Italy).
The entries for the anniversary edition of Jazz Juniors were assessed by an international jury comprising Nils Petter Molvær — Norwegian trumpeter and composer, one of the pioneers of nu-jazz and, for the past three years, Artistic Director of Jazz Juniors; Siv Øyunn Kjenstad — Norwegian drummer, vocalist, composer and rapper; and Piotr Orzechowski “Pianohooligan” — pianist and composer, one of the most distinctive voices on the contemporary Polish improvised music scene and a former Jazz Juniors Competition winner.
“When you listen to all these bands and then have to choose someone who will make it to the final, and perhaps go on to win the competition, you realise just how difficult the task is. Listening to all these recordings, I heard so many great, wonderful musicians, and it was truly a very difficult job. So I would like to say something to everyone who did not make it to the final: don’t give up, keep following your own path, because you are extraordinary musicians,” emphasises Nils Petter Molvær, Chair of the Jury and Artistic Director of Jazz Juniors.
The same jury will evaluate the young artists during the final auditions on 1 October at Cricoteka in Krakow. Admission to this part of the anniversary edition of Jazz Juniors is free.
The winners of the 50th Jazz Juniors Competition will receive the following prizes:
- Grand Prix — PLN 15,000
- Second Prize — PLN 6,000
- Third Prize — PLN 4,000
But the Jazz Juniors Competition is about more than financial prizes. In this anniversary edition, particular importance is attached to the International Partners Network, which continues to expand. New members offer additional prizes in the form of invitations to perform at international concerts, opening up opportunities for young musicians to present their work outside Poland.
This year’s international partners include:
- Branislav Dejanovic — Nisville Jazz Festival (Serbia)
- Enrico Moccia — Fara Music Festival & Emme Record Label (Italy)
- Zsolt Hernádi — Budapest Music Center (Hungary)
- Nikola Bluzik — Bluzika Jazz Fest Belgrade (Serbia)
- Michael Brovkine — Made in New York Jazz Festival & Competition (USA)
- Vinko Mihajlovic — Petrovac Jazz Festival (Montenegro)
- Saso Popovski — Jazz Factory Festival (North Macedonia)
- Vojislav Pantić — Pancevo Jazz Festival & Belgrade Jazz Festival (Serbia)
- Tina Lešničar — Jazz Festival Ljubljana (Slovenia)
- Dragan Vlajnic — Kikinda Jazz Fest (Serbia)
This international network of partners strengthens the idea of Jazz Juniors as a competition that not only identifies young talent, but also helps artists develop their careers, gain stage experience and build connections within the European jazz scene and beyond.
The anniversary edition of the Jazz Juniors Competition marks a special moment in the history of an event that has supported young musicians and promoted the development of jazz for five decades. The record number of entries, the international jury and the expanded cooperation with international partners all demonstrate that the competition continues to respond to the needs of successive generations of artists.
In keeping with the motto of the 50th edition: The Future Is Today!
Source: press release
