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Marsalis Leads The Faithful
This past weekend, to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Abyssinian Baptist Church, which is generally regarded as New York’s oldest Afro-American religious institution, Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Rose Hall was transformed into a kind of spiritual multiplex. Gospel choirs issued forth from every performance space, and also in the public atrium in between (where macaroni and cheese was served, presumably to evoke the provisions one might find at a Sunday school picnic). What artistic director Wynton Marsalis usually calls the House of Swing had become the House of Prayer. Keep reading »
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Marsalis Mass Honors Harlem Church
A young institution pays tribute to a venerable one with Wynton Marsalis’s “Abyssinian 200: A Celebration.” It was written for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, founded in 1988, in honor of the 200th anniversary of the Abyssinian Baptist Church, a bulwark of African-American New York City. The orchestra introduced the work last week at its own Rose Theater. Keep reading »
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Marsalis summons the spirit
In the early days of jazz in New Orleans, Saturday night was the flip side of Sunday morning. The call-and-response dynamic among a band’s players was inspired by preacher and congregation; trumpeters emulated the bent-note wails and chants of gospel song. Keep reading »
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Abyssinian 200: A Celebration
On April 10, 11, 12 & 19, Jazz at Lincoln Center celebrates The Abyssinian Baptist Church’s bicentennial with Abyssinian 200: A Celebration, a special mass and world premiere of music written by Wynton for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and the Abyssinian Baptist Church Choir.
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Wynton composes a mass for the Abyssinian Baptist Church
On April 10, 11 & 12, 2008, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra will premiere a special mass composed by Wynton Marsalis to commemorate the 200th anniversary of The Abyssinian Baptist Church.
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