What to See at the 2025 Biamp Portland Jazz Festival
The jazz fest is bigger than ever in its 22nd year, and culminates with an Erykah Badu show at the Moda Center.
If you don’t think jazz is your thing, think again. The genre has its roots in an early twentieth century blend of brass big bands, West African dance music, and blues. But jazz has forever been progressing and reimagining itself, famously doing so on the spot. At this year’s Biamp Portland Jazz Festival, produced for 22 years running by the nonprofit PDX Jazz, the genre’s modern range is on full display. Across 10 days (February 20–March 1), the festival is mounting dozens of shows at 30 venues across the city, including acts ranging R&B, soul, and rap. The lineup runs from free shows by local acts to an Erykah Badu stadium concert at the Moda Center—the festival’s biggest ever. Below, we picked out a few highlights to check out in the coming weeks.
Terence Blanchard
8pm Thu, Feb 20 | Newmark Theatre, $54.75–84.75
Blanchard makes a big splash starting things out this year. The eight-time Grammy winning trumpeter is known for his prolific film scores, many produced with Spike Lee, and no doubt his emotive brass noodling.
Erykah Badu.
Erykah Badu
8pm Fri, Feb 21 | Moda Center, $90–275+
Singular since her first album in 1997, Baduizm, Badu falls squarely into the neo soul genre (she all but invented it), but frequent comparisons to Billie Holiday make the case for her headlining a jazz festival. Zambian rapper Sampa the Great opens.
Christian McBride & Ursa Major
8pm Sun, Feb 23 | Revolution Hall, $52–80
McBride is another eight-time Grammy winner and the current artistic director of the Newport Jazz Festival who’s played with Herbie Hancock, Diana Krall, and James Brown—and Celine Dion, Isaac Hayes, and Carly Simon. Here, he’s playing with Ursa Major, a band he assembled of jazz up-and-comers.
Lizzie No
8pm Sun, Feb 23 | Polaris Hall, $36–42
With folk roots and her harp never far away, No became a critical darling last year with her genre-bending album Halfsies, and just released a live album, Commie Country, in January. “You can find us at the corner of cosmic folk and outlaw blues,” she wrote on Instagram recently.
The Philharmonik
8pm Fri, Feb 28 | Aladdin Theater, $45–50
Christian Gates’s group puts a jazzy twist on its symphonic name. Winners of NPR’s Tiny Desk Contest in 2024, the sprawling nonet (that’s nine musicians, including Gates) fill out Gates’s autobiographical songs as he dances on the keys and half-raps with a cultural critic’s edge.
Vijay Iyer Trio
8pm Fri, Feb 28 | Alberta Rose Theatre, $52–57
Iyer is regularly regarded as one of the best pianists working today. He formed his namesake trio in 2014, with Linda May Han Oh on bass and Tyshawn Sorey on drums; their latest as a group is Compassion, from 2024. Another album Iyer produced in another trio, Love in Exile, with Arooj Aftab and Shahzad Ismaily, was a New York Times favorite of 2023.
Ravi Coltrane
8pm Sat, Mar 1 | Newmark Theatre, $70–100
Coltrane is primarily a saxophonist, like his father John was, but this show celebrates his mother, the celebrated pianist and harpist Alice Coltrane’s final album, Translinear Light, which Ravi produced and played on, performed here with harpist Brandee Younger.
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