San Diego Tijuana International Jazz Festival
The San Diego Tijuana International Jazz Festival, which debuted in 2024 with nearly $400,000 in seed money from Qualcomm co-founder Irwin M. Jacobs, will return in expanded form this fall for its third year at multiple venues on both sides of the border. The event will grow from three days in 2024 and 2025 to four days this year. Free concerts will take place in downtown Tijuana and downtown San Diego, along with a paid concert at California Center for the Arts, Escondido, for which tickets go on sale May 30 at sdtjjazz.org.
This year’s roster includes drum dynamo and five-time Grammy Award-winner Brian Blade with his genre-blurring group, The Fellowship Band, and Panamanian-bred piano great Danilo Pérez, who is a three-time Grammy-winner. Blade and Pérez were both longtime members of the late saxophone legend Wayne Shorter’s quartet. Pérez, who heads the Global Jazz Institute at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, will perform here with the SDSU Jazz Ensembles and the Ensenada-based La Covacha Big Band.
Also set to appear is 2022 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition-winner Lucia, a native of Veracruz. Lucia performed here at the 2025 festival with her jazz band. She is returning with a four-man son jarocho group that features her father, Ramón Gutiérrez, a keen musical improviser and master of the four-stringed requinto.
In addition, the festival will present San Diego and Tijuana performances by the seven-piece Mingus Dynasty, which features tenor saxophonist Wayne Escoffery, pianist Helen Sung and Russian-born bassist Boris Kozlov. The band pays tribute to the music of modern jazz pioneer Charles Mingus and will perform some pieces from his classic 1957 album, “Tijuana Moods.”
Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and UC San Diego music professor Anthony Davis is a lifelong Mingus fan. He has agreed to write a new piece for Mingus Dynasty to play at the festival, which is now seeking underwriting for what will be a world premiere if funding is found.
Your Festival Pass $54 – $90 including fees (face value $45-$75). gives you access and reserved seating for three stellar performances in the Concert Hall by this year’s headliners – multi-Grammy winning drum virtuoso Brian Blade, scintillating Latin jazz pianist and composer Danilo Pérez, and the all-star 7-piece Mingus Dynasty band from NYC. Start the day with a free outdoor concert by Charlie Chavez y su Afrotruko, and enjoy another free outdoor performance by Lucia and the Familia Gutierrez during the picnic-style dinner break with food trucks and beverage service.
$125 “Friends of the Festival” Premium Ticket Add-On available (must also have a $45 – $75 paid ticket to the festival concerts).
Friends of the Festival Add-On includes the following:
- reserved premium parking
- access to the Cantina on the Green
- private restroom facilities
- dinner interlude (5:00-6:30 pm) listen to Lucía and the Familia Gutiérrez with reserved seating in the “Cantina” and enjoy an elevated rancho-style farm-to-table seasonal culinary experience by celebrated North County chef Juan González of Mesa Agricola, plus hosted bar service with regional wines.
