Montreux Jazz Festival 2026: The 60th Edition Guide
Raye
From 3 to 18 Jul 2026
The 60th Montreux Jazz Festival runs from July 3 to 18, 2026 on the shores of Lake Geneva, and the milestone framing actually holds up this year. Charles Lloyd, who played the very first edition in 1967, is back on the bill. Marcus Miller is leading a "We Want Miles!" tribute to Miles Davis. Cerrone is closing the Lab with a "Disco Symphonic" orchestral set. These are programming choices, not nostalgia, and they sit alongside one of the most genuinely cross-genre lineups in Europe this summer.
Explore the full event on Outhere and discover other festivals, exhibitions and cultural moments worth building a July trip around. This guide walks through Montreux Jazz Festival 2026 across the two main paid venues, the free lakeside programme, and the practical notes for arriving in Switzerland ready to use the festival well.
The 60th edition is also the return of the Auditorium Stravinski after a two-year renovation hiatus. The festival now uses two ticketed indoor venues, the lakeside quays, and a string of outdoor stages that link them together. The visual identity for the anniversary, designed by Kévin Germanier, is high-contrast and flamboyant, all saturated colour and layered texture, which is a useful frame for the programming itself. RAYE's opening, the Lab debut and Marcus Miller's tribute are all programmed within the first six nights, which means the front half of the festival is loaded.
Montreux's history is part of why this all works. The festival has been running since 1967 and the Stravinski stage has hosted Aretha Franklin, Prince, David Bowie, Nina Simone and Miles Davis over six decades. The 60th edition is the first since the renovation where they have all the rooms back, and the lineup reflects a programme team using the full instrument again.
Auditorium Stravinski: The Main Stage
The Stravinski is where the headliners land. It is the 4,000-capacity room that anchors the festival, and the 2026 programme treats the reopening accordingly.
RAYE on Opening Night
The London singer-songwriter opens the festival on July 3 with a show co-created with Audemars Piguet, built exclusively for Montreux. The stage design has been described as "never before seen at Montreux," with special guests still under wraps. For an artist whose 2024 sweep of the BRITs reset what a major-label-free pop career can look like, opening the 60th edition is a statement booking. Why it matters: this is the only RAYE show in Switzerland in 2026, and the format is genuinely one-off, built for the room rather than slotted into a tour. RAYE is also performing at festivals across the UK and mainland Europe through summer 2026. Discover more of her dates on Outhere if Montreux falls outside your window.
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds are touring the "Wild God" material with a full band and choir, the kind of show that has been turning festival fields into something closer to a service. The Stravinski's acoustics suit the format. For anyone tracking the post-2024 Bad Seeds live work, this is one of the few European indoor festival rooms where the choir arrangement actually lands.
Date TBC, July 2026 | Auditorium Stravinski | Montreux
Sting, Van Morrison, James Taylor, Deep Purple
The legacy headliners anchor the middle of the festival. Sting plays a career-spanning set. Van Morrison and James Taylor each bring decades of catalogue, with Deep Purple taking the rock side of the booking. Why this matters at Montreux: the Stravinski is one of the few rooms where these artists routinely deliver sit-down, attentive shows rather than the rotating-festival treatment. The terraces and tiered seating help.
PinkPantheress, Tyla, Young Miko, Conan Gray
The Stravinski's pop side is where the festival's reach into 2026's current sound is most visible. PinkPantheress, Tyla, Young Miko and Conan Gray sit on the bill alongside Lewis Capaldi, Zara Larsson, Givēon, Hemlocke Springs and Dermot Kennedy. Over half of these artists are playing their only Swiss show in Montreux. PinkPantheress in particular is touring a much-evolved live setup in 2026, with the production scaled up significantly from her earlier club-circuit dates.
Vulfpeck, The Roots, John Legend, Isley Brothers, Yebba
The funk, hip-hop, soul and jazz-adjacent cohort gives the Stravinski its musical centre of gravity. Vulfpeck rarely play festivals at this scale outside of North America. The Roots arrive in their full live-band incarnation. John Legend and the Isley Brothers cover the soul lineage, with Yebba bridging the gospel and jazz ends. A Yebba Smith vocal feature on a Stravinski stage is a serious thing. This is the cluster that most reminds you Montreux is still, in the bones of its booking, a jazz and Black music festival.
If the Stravinski is where the festival's reputation lives, the Montreux Jazz Lab is where its risks are taken. The Lab is smaller, more intimate, and the room where this year's most interesting programming sits. For readers who only know Montreux by name, the Lab is the revelation.
Eddy de Pretto Opens with "Lonely Club"
The French singer opens the Lab with "Lonely Club," a hybrid music and contemporary dance piece. Eddy de Pretto has spent the past few years pushing his stage work past the standard solo-artist format, and "Lonely Club" leans into that: choreography, lighting design and a band built around the dancers rather than the other way around. Why it matters: this is the kind of project made for a room like the Lab and rarely toured afterwards. The Lab's intimacy makes the dance element actually readable.
July 2026 | Montreux Jazz Lab | Montreux
Marcus Miller Leads "We Want Miles!"
Marcus Miller leads a tribute to Miles Davis built around the live material from the late period of Davis's career, when Miller himself was part of the band. "We Want Miles!" is not a covers set. It is a conversation between the living jazz canon and the player who helped write part of it, with a band that has been workshopping the arrangements specifically for this booking. Why it matters: Miller's Davis-era catalogue is not a regular fixture of his current touring set, and this Lab show is one of the few European dates where the full programme is being performed.
July 2026 | Montreux Jazz Lab | Montreux
Charles Lloyd Returns to Montreux
Charles Lloyd performed at the very first Montreux Jazz Festival in 1967. He is back for the 60th edition. At 88, his recent ECM records and live work have been among the most quietly powerful jazz output of the past decade. The Sky Trio and Marvels material from the 2020s lands particularly well in small rooms like the Lab. Why it matters: this is one of the few bookings on the 2026 bill where the word "milestone" lands without quotation marks. Lloyd's appearance closes a circle that very few living artists can close.
July 2026 | Montreux Jazz Lab | Montreux
Cerrone Closes with "Disco Symphonic"
Cerrone closes the Lab programme with "Disco Symphonic," an orchestral reworking of his 1970s disco catalogue. The original records, "Supernature" especially, are still being sampled and re-released, and the orchestral format has been gaining traction with audiences who first encountered the music through samples rather than the originals. Why it matters: this is Cerrone with a full ensemble, not a DJ set, and the Lab is small enough that the brass and strings actually carry. Cerrone is also performing select European orchestral dates in autumn 2026. Discover more on Outhere if you want to catch this format elsewhere.
Here is the part most coverage of Montreux skips. Over 60% of the festival is free. More than 250 concerts, DJ sets and jam sessions run every afternoon and evening along the lakeside quays, with no ticket required.
The free programme is not a fringe afterthought. It runs daily at outdoor terraces, the Lake House and a string of smaller venues along the extended quay route, with jazz jams, DJ sets, emerging-artist showcases and late-night sessions that often run past the headline shows ending. The festival is structurally built so that you can arrive for two weeks, hold a ticket for one or two headline nights, and still hear serious music every day you are there.
This changes the practical maths for visitors. A short visit anchored to one Stravinski ticket can be paired with two or three full days on the quays without buying anything else. A longer stay can be built almost entirely around the free programme. The quay schedule is the most useful thing to know about Montreux Jazz Festival 2026, and the reason the town functions as a public cultural space for two weeks in July rather than a venue with a queue.
A few patterns worth knowing about the free schedule:
Afternoons are for discovery. Early-career artists, jazz school showcases and DJ warm-ups run from roughly mid-afternoon onward. This is the best window to catch acts you have not heard of and the calmest part of the festival site.
Evenings shift to peak crowds. As the Stravinski and Lab fill up for the paid programme, the free outdoor stages take on a second wave of audiences, including people who came specifically for what is on the quays.
Late nights bring the jams. Once the headline sets end, the jam sessions tend to run long. This is where festival musicians often turn up unannounced.
250+ shows on the lakeside quays, no booking required
MAIN VENUES
Auditorium Stravinski, Montreux Jazz Lab
Getting there
Geneva Airport is the main entry. Direct trains run roughly every half hour and take just over an hour, arriving into Montreux station a few minutes' walk above the festival site. Rail connections from Zurich, Milan and Paris also work cleanly. The Swiss rail network sells point-to-point tickets at the station, and SBB Mobile handles bookings in advance.
Where to stay
Montreux fills up early for the festival window. Vevey, Lausanne and Villeneuve sit on the same rail line within 10 to 30 minutes, and staying one stop down the lake keeps the late-night train option open. The CGN lake boats also run a summer schedule that connects several lakeside towns, which is a slower but worth-knowing alternative to the train.
When to arrive
Free shows on the quays start in the afternoon. Paid concerts at the Stravinski and Lab run in the evening, with most headliners on at 21:00 or 22:00. Plan to be on the quays from late afternoon onward. That is when the festival site comes alive and the free programming starts to layer up.
Keep Exploring on Outhere
Build your July around the festival with Montreux Jazz Festival 2026 on Outhere, or follow individual artists like RAYE, Charles Lloyd, Marcus Miller, Cerrone and Eddy de Pretto to catch their other 2026 dates. For more context on the European summer, our guides 10 Best Music Festivals in the World, Awakenings Festival 2026, and SPRING Performing Arts Festival Utrecht cover the wider festival calendar, and our Switzerland hub gathers what else is happening around Lake Geneva that month.
Outhere is a cultural discovery platform that helps people find arts, music, theatre and nightlife events around the world. Use it to track artists, save events, and plan trips around the moments that actually matter to you.
Frequently Asked Questions
When is Montreux Jazz Festival 2026?
Montreux Jazz Festival 2026 runs from July 3 to July 18, 2026, across 16 nights on the shores of Lake Geneva in Switzerland. The 60th edition opens with RAYE at the Auditorium Stravinski on July 3 and closes with Cerrone's "Disco Symphonic" at the Montreux Jazz Lab on July 18.
Is Montreux Jazz Festival free?
Over 60% of Montreux Jazz Festival 2026 is free. More than 250 concerts, DJ sets and jam sessions run every day along the lakeside quays with no ticket required. The paid programme covers headline shows at the Auditorium Stravinski and the Montreux Jazz Lab, with tickets sold via Ticketcorner.
How do I get to Montreux from Geneva Airport?
Direct trains run from Geneva Airport to Montreux roughly every half hour, with a journey time of just over one hour. Trains arrive at Montreux station, a few minutes' walk above the festival site. No transfer is needed, and tickets can be bought at the airport station or via SBB Mobile in advance.
What's the difference between the Stravinski and the Jazz Lab?
The Auditorium Stravinski is the main 4,000-capacity venue that hosts the festival's headliners, including RAYE, Sting, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and PinkPantheress in 2026. The Montreux Jazz Lab is the smaller, more experimental room, where Charles Lloyd, Marcus Miller, Eddy de Pretto and Cerrone are programmed this year.
Who is headlining Montreux Jazz Festival 2026?
The 2026 headliners include RAYE, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Sting, Van Morrison, James Taylor, Deep Purple, Lewis Capaldi, PinkPantheress, Tyla, John Legend, The Roots, Vulfpeck and the Isley Brothers at the Stravinski, with Charles Lloyd, Marcus Miller, Eddy de Pretto and Cerrone at the Lab.
