Montreux Archives Cut Loose
The world's leading festival of jazz, rock and pop has created music history for almost four decades. Soon that history will be unearthed and cleaned up for an encore. The 3500 archived hours of film and sound recordings are being prepared for broadcast and consumer release.

The Montreux Festival was started in 1967 by Claude Nobs, who remains CEO of the Festival. Recently Nobs awarded UK-based Eagle Vision the multimedia sales rights to what Eagle executives call "one of the finest archives ever - a fabulous treasure trove."

No details yet on which performances will be the first to appear on television or DVD, but the list of performers in the archives includes: Miles Davis, David Bowie, Hugh Masekela, Garbage, Buddy Guy, Ella Fitzgerald, John Lee Hooker, Paul Simon, Jamiroquai, Isaac Hayes, Basement Jaxx, David Gray, George Benson, Diana Krall, Deep Purple, R.E.M., Pat Metheny, Bob Dylan, Santana, Bjork, Eric Clapton, The Corrs, Paco De Lucia, Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin, ZZ Top, George Clinton, Simply Red, James Taylor Quartet, Ice T, B.B. King, Van Morrison, Johnny Cash, Fats Domino, Phil Collins, Courtney Pine, Elvis Costello, Dizzy Gillespie, Count Basie and Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Forward-thinking Nobs started using HDTV format back in 1991, making the most recent decade of the festival even more valuable for future TV viewing.

The final release of any of the material hinges on obtaining releases from the artists and their labels and publishers.

Learn about the 38th Montreux Festival, which will take place from July 2-17, 2004, or visit the related Montreux Sounds site, which includes a searchable concerts database.

Visit Eagle Rock Entertainment and read their press release about the Montreux archives