Back in February, Martin Ludlow, a former Los Angeles City Councilman, announced the inaugural edition of the LA Jazz Festival, a new music extravaganza that he'd founded. The festival was set to include a few weeks of performances in parks and nightclubs across Los Angeles, as well as a Caribbean street carnival in Venice and a two-day mini-fest called Jazz On The Beach that was set to feature artists like John Legend, Janelle Monaé, Raphael Saadiq, Charlie Wilson, and George Clinton's Parliament Funkadelic. But just before the festival's Aug. 7 kickoff show, which Lalah Hathaway was booked to headline, the entire festival was canceled under mysterious circumstances.
As the Los Angeles Daily News reports, on Thursday a festival spokesman said that all of the programming would have to be "postponed." Late on Friday afternoon, Martin Ludlow released a written statement saying that he was canceling the entire festival. Ludlow wrote:
Due to significant, unanticipated last-minute public safety and municipal costs associated with the final permitting of the On The Beach Festival, we have reached the decision to unfortunately postpone this year’s inaugural LA Jazz Festival...
Although this decision was an extremely difficult one to reach, our commitment to the audiences and artists participating in the festival is to have a first-class experience worthy of the great legacy of jazz and our great city. We were encouraged by the enthusiastic support of the artists on the bill, the fans and our sponsors for this inaugural event, and we look forward to presenting all of the components of this incredible cultural opportunity for Los Angeles and the world in 2027 and beyond.
The last-minute decision leaves artists and vendors in the lurch. Booking agent Maurice Montoya, who represents 15 acts that planned to play the festival, tells the LA Times, "To cancel one week or less before the events are about to start is sort of off. It’s not professional, to say the least... When you’re running into the kind of troubles that would make you cancel an event, you’re probably running into them 60 days out."
In his statement, Ludlow said that ticket buyers would be receiving refunds within 30 days, but he didn't say anything about payment to performers, some of whom reportedly made travel plans without countersigned contracts. LA's CBS News also spoke to some vendors, as well as would-be festival artist Isaiah Collier about the way their plans were impacted.
The festival's Instagram page has nothing about the cancellation. It hasn't been updated in the past week.
The festival's website now says that the fest is happening Aug. 22-23, but it's unclear what that refers to.
