A concert night at JAM, a jazz club in Marseille -

Marc Robert

  • The JAM in Marseille and the Jazz Fola near Aix-en-Provence had to close their doors permanently due to the health and economic crisis linked to Covid-19.

  • Complementary, these two jazz clubs attracted a loyal public, which today worries about the future, just like the musicians.

The hottest jazz musicians in New York right now?

Many have been there, at JAM, a small club in the Plaine district of Marseille.

Sullivan Fortner, undoubtedly the greatest pianist after Brad Mehldau, but also saxophonist Marcus Strickland and the essential trumpeter Jeremy Pelt.

"Him, because of the strikes, we had to rent a truck, go and pick him up with his quintet in Mâcon where he was playing the night before, that's one of my fondest memories", confides John Massa, programmer of the JAM and himself a musician.

"Today, it is the end of the JAM, we were forced to give up the lease", continues this enthusiast, recalling that the premises have been hosting music for forty years in Marseille.

With the definitive closure of JAM, but also of Jazz Fola near Aix-en-Provence, the region is losing its two main jazz clubs because of the health crisis.

"When we saw in December that things were starting again in the same spirit, without visibility, we preferred to throw in the towel, we cannot work with changes of measure every week", explains double bassist Jean-Paul Artero, who opened the Jazz Fola in 2017. The aid of 1,500 euros per month for the first confinement?

It was not enough to compensate the 6,000 euros monthly fixed costs.

"We borrowed to make a cash flow, we hoped it would start again, but the decision not to reopen on December 15 was the final blow," he said.

"The fragile economy of lemonade makers"

“It's a fragile and threatened economy,” recalls trumpeter Christophe Le Loil, a regular at both places.

Unless you own the walls, jazz clubs are lemonade, that's how they still earn a little their living, and still not well.

"They are real homes for musicians," he continues.

The JAM like the Jazz Fola, they had won the loyalty of an audience.

There was this happy thing, this friendliness.

It's very rare the times when we played and it wasn't full, people were willing to pay 15 euros to listen to live music.

"

“At the start, the project was to create a place to do jam sessions, there was not necessarily the ambition to do a specific program, rewinds John Massa.

We let ourselves be overwhelmed, we did four concerts a week, the whole world came.

The goal was to catch the musicians on tour.

»Unlike Jazz Fola, the JAM had an associative and voluntary structure.

“We had a rent of 1,000 euros per month, after a year without opening, we are washed out.

The owner, a retired private individual, did what he could to wait.

"

"We feel like an orphan"

"We are all a little lost, we talk to each other and we feel like an orphan," says Marc Robert, passionate about jazz and photography.

He rarely missed a concert.

“These two venues were going well, there was a real dynamic, an audience, and an interesting mix with young and old.

"They were very complementary," he observes.

The JAM was the small room, with a breeding ground for talent and perhaps more sophisticated jazz.

Jazz Fola was a more open jazz, more entertainment, there was also a small restaurant to eat.

"

There is certainly still the Roll'Studio at the Panier and the Rouge at the Belle de Mai, but the closure of these two places, which were working well, sounds like a big blow to the blues.

“It's a bad sign, difficult to take,” said Christophe Le Loil.

For me, a musician, the jazz club is part of my DNA, of my functioning, of my professional practice.

"

"There will be a stage of reconstruction"

"The jazz musician is not a rock musician, there are no big tours, not necessarily albums, he needs to go out and play three times a week to confront others, to meet the public ”, replies John Massa.

He does not think that the jazz house project on the Canebière will change the situation for the future: “From what I understand, it is just Marseille Jazz des Cinq Continents which is leaving rue Beauvau to settle on the Canebière.

I love their work, but it won't be a club that has concerts every night.

We had a real jazz club life.

"

Our file on Marseille

"In Marseille, it will take a long time before leaving, it will be complicated", he fears, before adding: "We are talking about jazz, but practically all the nice associative places to listen to live music have closed. on the Plain.

There will be a stage of reconstruction.

»How long will it take, in which places?

Impossible for the moment to project.

But John Massa does not want to end on a sad note: “We don't want to let it go, we'll leave.

"

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  • Covid 19

  • Coronavirus

  • Curfew

  • Marseilles

  • Jazz

  • Culture