Rosanna Durham

What London can give jazz music — beyond an audience in its concert halls — is a setting to match the music’s diversity. The city offers access, culturally, to what is European, American, African and more. And so it is with the London Jazz Festival (9–18 November), whose extensive programme is significant both for its cultural mix and for its line-up of jazz’s greatest living musicians. 2012 marks the festival’s 17th outing, with over 250 concerts, 40 hours of which are to be broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Performers will include the legendary saxophonist Sonny Rollins (16 November, Barbican), who recorded with Miles Davis before he was 20. Now aged 82, Rollins is passing through London on a seven-date European tour.

Not many peacocks could handle an 8,000-strong festival audience. But such is the gentle atmosphere of the annual End of the Road music festival — set in the historic Larmer Tree Gardens, north Dorset — that the resident peacocks get on just fine with their weekend visitors. Last weekend was the seventh outing of the festival and, true to form, the line-up did not have something for everyone’s musical taste. Listening to unfamiliar music was half the joy of the weekend. Still, the curators have a strong musical bias so it is a good thing I enjoy Americana, modern folk, blues and indie pop; otherwise there were the peacocks for entertainment. Headliners included Grizzly Bear, Beach House and Grandaddy.