Jazz fans in Turkey will always remember the 8th of July 1984 when Chick Corea and Steve Kujala performed at the Atatürk Cultural Center as part of the İstanbul Festival. Marking the beginning of things to come, the concert proved that jazz should play a larger role in the İstanbul Festival, and that the musical spectrum of the Festival should be extended to cover many other musical styles.

With the first stadium concert in Turkey featuring Bryan Adams, and a later concert by Sting and the Scorpions, the emphasis on jazz and other kinds of "urban music" in the İstanbul Festival increased and grew far beyond the framework of the Festival.

Thus, in 1994, the Foundation announced that jazz, too, was to be a separate annual event and the first International İstanbul Jazz Festival was organized in the same year.

One of the best organized festivals in Europe, the International İstanbul Jazz Festival has brought many renowned artists, including Eric Clapton, Norah Jones, Robert Plant, Sting, Tori Amos, Elvis Costello, Massive Attack, Björk, Deep Forest, Dead Can Dance, Michael Bolton, Loreena McKennitt, Diana Krall, Suzanne Vega, Patti Smith, Bobby McFerrin, Randy Crawford, The Manhattan Transfer, Jan Garbarek, Keith Jarrett, Wynton Marsalis, Goran Bregoviç, Bryan Ferry, Lou Reed, Ute Lemper,Ryuichi Sakamoto, Roni Size, Dizzy Gillepsie, Paco de Lucia, Nick Cave, John Scofield, Simply Red, Jane Birkin, Brad Mehldau, Marcus Miller, Mercedes Sosa, Marianne Faithfull, Pj Harvey, Jan Garbarek, Roy Haynes, Billy Cobham, Chick Corea, Dianne Reeves, Pat Metheny, Charlie Haden, Caetano Veloso, Herbie Hancock and George Benson to İstanbul’s music lovers. With its boundless energy it has become one of the most important events on the İstanbul cultural scene.