Spital Beats runs every Friday from 5pm to 7pm until 28 August, with DJ sets, live jazz and vinyl evenings in the heart of East London.
If you needed an excuse to knock off at a reasonable hour on a Friday, here it is. Old Spitalfields Market is running a free weekly live music series every Friday until the end of August, and it’s exactly the kind of low-effort, high-reward plan that summer in London should produce more of.
Spital Beats takes over the market from 5pm to 7pm each week, with an eclectic lineup rotating through DJ sets, live jazz and blues, and vinyl evenings. Street food from The Kitchens and drinks from KERB Sports Bar are on hand, which means the two-hour window has a tendency to become rather longer than intended.
The July lineup is worth noting: DJ Sooyeon plays on 10 and 17 July, Spitz brings live jazz and blues on 24 July, and something unannounced is pencilled in for 31 July, which is usually a sign worth paying attention to. The vinyl evening strand is hosted by The Cockney Sikh in collaboration with Chai Guys, which is a combination that sounds considerably more interesting than a standard DJ set.
Old Spitalfields Market is already one of the better reasons to be in E1 on a weekday evening, with The Kitchens offering some of the more reliable street food options in the area. Adding a free live music programme to that makes it a genuine Friday destination rather than just somewhere you pass through on the way to Shoreditch.
The London x London Take: Free, post-work, live music, street food, no booking required. This is the ideal summer Friday format and we’re genuinely not sure why more markets don’t do it.
Need to Know
- Where: Old Spitalfields Market, Commercial Street, London E1 6BJ
- When: Every Friday, 5pm to 7pm, until 28 August 2026
- Price: Free
