Lala’s hidden Jazz

Jazzcafé Dizzy sits on the 's Gravendijkwal in Rotterdam and has been a home for live jazz since 1977. It describes itself as one of the premier jazz clubs in the Netherlands and a cultural institution in the city. The room is small and cozy, built around a bar area, a podium for the musicians and tables for the audience, which keeps listeners close to the stage. Music is on offer seven days a week, and the café also serves food, with the owner, Mustafa Cingoz, remembered by some visitors for his hospitality in the kitchen. The programme is wide rather than narrowly traditional. Alongside straight jazz, the agenda covers jam sessions such as the regular Blowin sessions and Jazz & Jam nights, blues bands, themed evenings like an Italian jazz night, and a strong thread of Brazilian music, with trios and singers from that scene appearing in the same month. Reggae nights also turn up in the listings, sometimes tied to other Rotterdam locations. Evening concerts typically start in the late evening, around half past nine. Dizzy also plays a part in the wider Rotterdam jazz scene. Jazz International Rotterdam, a programmer that works without a stage of its own, has collaborated with it alongside LantarenVenster and De Doelen. Visitors tend to describe it as authentic and well kept, a hideaway for jazz fans where there is almost always a good band playing. For anyone in Rotterdam looking for live jazz on a given night, it is one of the few places in the city where that is close to a safe bet.