Newport Jazz Festival Newport Jazz Festival The Newport Jazz Festival is a music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island. Elaine Lorillard established the festival in 1954, and she and husband Louis Lorillard financed it for many years. They hired George Wein to organize the first festival and bring jazz to Rhode Island. Most of the early festivals were broadcast on Voice of America radio, and many performances were recorded and released as albums. In 1972, the Newport Jazz Festival was moved to New York City. In 1981, it became a two-site festival when it was returned to Newport while continuing in
TD Edmonton International Jazz Festival down. After this early prototype festival, the Edmonton Jazz Festival Society was formed in an effort to add some structure to the festival and avoid some of the financial and organizational pitfalls that Jazz City had faced. In 2006, the newly formed Edmonton Jazz Festival Society sought financial aid from the Edmonton Arts Council and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, and partnered with the Jazz Society of the Yardbird Suite to co-host the next instalment of the festival. That year's festival saw the formation of The Edmonton Jazz Orchestra, which is a collection of 18 local musicians who compose,