The story
Riverboat Jazz Festival in Silkeborg
Riverboat Jazz Festival began in 1966 with three passenger boats making a two-hour New Orleans jazz cruise up the Gudena river from Silkeborg, an idea inspired by a Thames musical cruise in London. Now running five days each last weekend of June with more than 60 orchestras and soloists for around 35,000 attendees, the festival has expanded across the whole inner city, harbour and lakes while keeping performances on the water as its signature feature.
Three small passenger boats making a two-hour voyage up the Gudena river launched Riverboat Jazz Festival in 1966, an idea sparked when one of the festival's founders experienced a musical river cruise on the Thames in London and returned to Silkeborg wondering whether the same idea might work on the Gudena, where river steamers were already running scheduled routes.