Manchester Jazz Festival announces return of the Manchester Piano Trail

Manchester Jazz Festival has once again teamed up with Forsyth Music Shop to announce the return of the much-loved piano trail.

Dedicated to discovering Manchester’s hidden musical talents, a trail of street pianos will be spread across 13 city centre locations, with passersby encouraged to get creative and try their hand at tickling the ivories.

The trail will run from Thu 27 Apr – Sun 28 May, with the Mayor of Great Manchester, Andy Burnham, launching the trail this Thursday from 1pm at Piccadilly Train Station. The launch will feature performances by Leo Cheung – last year’s piano trail winner – and Edward Harris-Brown, a young pianist from Chetham’s School of Music and some of his fellow students.

A number of prizes will be offered as part of the trail, including a Yamaha Digital Piano P-45B, train tickets, a wine-tasting session at Harvey Nichols, food and drink vouchers for some of Manchester’s favourite restaurants and more. To be in with a chance of winning a prize, simply find one of the pianos in the trail, capture a short video of your performance (2 minutes max) and post the video to your Instagram, Facebook or Twitter account (*not as a story). Tag mjf @manchesterjazzfestival on Facebook or Instagram or @manjazzfest on Twitter and use the hashtag #mjfpianotrail2023.

Alongside the piano trail, there will also be two bespoke piano trail walking tours available, run by the Free Manchester Walking Tours, on Sat 13 May & Sat 27 May (£10 per adult, £5 per child) and a handful of scheduled performances at Harvey Nichols and the Corn Exchange.

Speaking about the festival, Andy Burnham said: “This city-region has music running through its veins, and helping connect people to new musical experiences and supporting talented musicians has always been so important to us. The mjf2023 piano trail will take music back out onto the streets of Manchester, giving more people the chance to try their hand at playing and to encounter the vibrant music of our city in a really unique way.”

The mjf piano trail is delivered in partnership with the world-renowned Forsyth Music Shop and is part of Manchester Jazz Festival, which will take place at 10 venues across the city from 19 – 28 May. You can find more information about the piano trail here, and book Manchester Jazz Festival tickets below.