Grace Jones, Mary J. Blige And Others Shine At North Sea Jazz Festival 2017

Last weekend saw another North Sea Jazz Festival come and go, with a string of performances from some of the greatest soul singers alive including Grace Jones, Solange and Mary J. Blige. The big event took place in Rotterdam across a number of stages at the Ahoy arena.

At the top of the list were gospel veteran Mavis Staples and new wave legend Grace Jones - who are still rocking arenas at 69 and 78-years-old respectively. The former released her most recent studio album 'Livin' on a High Note' last year, and has since made guest appearances on songs like Arcade Fire's 'I Give You Power' and Gorillaz's 'Let Me Out'. Grace, meanwhile, hasn't released anything since her 2015 70s 'Disco' box set, though she did also appear on Gorillaz's 'Humanz' album.

For the most part, the North Sea Jazz Festival was a blast from the not so distant past with 90s and early 2000s artists like funk group Jamiroquai, hip hop trio De La Soul and R&B singer Mary J. Blige.

We've heard new material from all three of them in the last year, what with Jamiroquai's critically acclaimed 'Automaton', De La Soul's Grammy nominated 'and the Anonymous Nobody...' and Mary's Capitol release 'Strength of a Woman'.

Beyonce's talented sister Solange Knowles was another highlight, continuing her reign as one of the best R&B singers in the charts at the moment on her A Seat by the Table Tour. She won a Grammy earlier this year for Best R&B Performance for her hit single 'Cranes in the Sky'.

Meanwhile, we also saw one of the youngest performers of the night Joss Stone, the Brit nominated Laura Mvula, The Queen of Neo Soul Erykah Badu, jazz and blues legend Madeleine Peyroux and the chart-topping Usher - the latter of whom was joined by The Roots.

More: Mavis Staples does charity single with Arcade Fire

North Sea Jazz Festival returns to the Netherlands on July 13th to 15th 2018.