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Wynton Marsalis: Blowing up a storm
When Wynton Marsalis steps on stage at Radio City Music Hall in New York next month, he will have achieved recognition the likes of which no jazz musician has received before. Others have been honoured with monuments or awards. Dizzy Gillespie famously performed his tune “Salt Peanuts” with Jimmy Carter at the White House. Keep reading »
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Wynton Marsalis: The 2006 TIME 100
My friend Wynton Marsalis comes from a rich musical-family tradition in New Orleans that I share with my family. From that core of talent and tradition has sprung an amazing young man who has worn many hats in his career: musician, composer, ambassador, activist, arts administrator and more. He’s an original in so many ways and has a tremendous influence on the popularity of modern jazz and its deep roots in New Orleans history. We share a love for our universally beloved hometown and were shattered by its recent destruction.
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History joins with melody on Big Easy stage
“More soaring, more powerful,” Wynton Marsalis told the brass section. “I need more freedom in the music.” Keep reading »
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Jazz great laments politics of New Orleans revival
NEW ORLEANS - Wynton Marsalis is an impatient man, so for the jazz trumpeter who’s become a global ambassador for New Orleans culture, the politics of reconstruction in his battered city are frustrating. Through 7-1/2 months of rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina, issues like bloated reconstruction contracts and loose minimum wage requirements have only added to the frustration, Marsalis said in an interview on Monday. Keep reading »
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‘Congo’ dedicated to New Orleans
Wynton Marsalis has lived in the Big Apple for more than 25 years, but his heart is still in the Big Easy, as befits a New Orleans native whose music is steeped in the rich cultural traditions of his hometown. Keep reading »
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Marsalis mixes it up
Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra celebrate his native New Orleans next week with the premiere of Congo Square, an 80-minute composition co-written and performed with Ghanian drum master Yacub Addy and his nine-piece ensemble, Odadaa!
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Secrets of greatness: How I work
You don’t want trumpet players and musicians being your primary business decision-makers. It’s not possible for me to do that and write music, program the season, and conduct the band. I really do let people do their jobs, so when we come together, we know what each is supposed to do. But I weigh in on everything.
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Jazz at Lincoln Center Plans More ‘Sweep’ in New Season
Conservatism has been the charge most often leveled at Jazz at Lincoln Center by its critics over the years. So it is significant that the organization’s next season, its third since it established a permanent home in the Time Warner Center at Columbus Circle, advances the theme “Innovations in Jazz.”
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Shaken but Not Broken
The impact of Katrina really hit me when I couldn’t find the restaurant that serves my favorite po’ boy sandwiches. I was in the Uptown area, looking for Mandina’s. But everything around it was devastated. So I kept driving back and forth and looking—even though I also knew that if I did find it, there was no way in the world it would be open.
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Wynton’s interview and photo from Yokohama
YOKOHAMA, Japan—Wynton was halfway through an explanation of whether he thinks his hometown, New Orleans, will ever really come back from the devastation of last summer’s Hurricane Katrina when he stopped and shifted direction. He got stranded in Chicago, he said, on his way over to Japan for a week of workshops for kids. With nowhere in particular to go, he just naturally hooked up with another New Orleans native living there.
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