BRANDEE YOUNGER
The sonically innovative harpist, Brandee Younger, is revolutionizing harp for the digital era. Over the past fifteen years, she has worked relentlessly to stretch boundaries and limitations for harpists. In 2022, she made history by becoming the first black woman to be nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition. That same year, she was also nominated for an NAACP Image Award. Ever-expanding as an artist, she has worked with cultural icons including Common, Lauryn Hill, John Legend, and Moses Sumney. Her current album, Brand New Life, builds on her already rich oeuvre, and cements the harp’s place in pop culture. As the title of the album suggests, Brand New Life is about forging new paths–artistic, personal, political, and spiritual. On this album, Younger salutes her musical foremother, the trailblazing harpist Dorothy Ashby, while also speaking to the sentiments of more recent generations. “We’re bringing new life to Dorothy Ashby’s popular and previously unreleased compositions. We’re creating new life…for the instrument,” Younger said. Brand New Life is an album about living fully, in neon bright color.
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JAZZMEIA HORN
Named by her jazz loving grandmother, Jazzmeia Horn was born in Dallas, Texas, in 1991. She grew up in a close church-going family singing gospel music.
Ms. Horn graduated from Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, which was attended by other great artists such as Roy Hargrove, Norah Jones, and Erykah Badu. In 2009, she enrolled at The School of Jazz at The New School in New York City.
Ms. Horn won the 2013 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition and the 2015 Thelonious Monk Institute International Jazz Competition and, shortly after, was signed by Concord Records. In 2017, she released her debut album, A Social Call, which was nominated for a Grammy Award.
Ms. Horn continued to tour nationally and internationally, honing her vocal, performance and writing skills, to get across her message about the global need for love and social change in the world. In 2019, she released Love and Liberation which also received a Grammy nomination. The following year, she published her book, Strive From Within: The Jazzmeia Horn Approach, while recording her big band album, Dear Love.
Dear Love, an album of encouragement through poetry and spoken word addressing the aspects of her community, her love and herself, was released in September 2021.
All while performing, writing, and preparing for a fall 2023 release of her new album, Ms. Horn is teaching students and conducting outreach programs across the globe through The Jazz Horn International Vocal Initiative.
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MARQUIS HILL
Winner of the 2014 Thelonious Monk International Trumpet Competition, Chicago-born trumpeter Marquis Hill has, in a comparatively short time, established his well-deserved reputation as a leading figure among today’s crop of most adventurous jazz musicians. He returns with compositions from his new album and band project, Composers Collective, featuring an all-star ensemble that includes keyboardist Mike King, bassist Junius Paul, vibraphonist Joel Ross, and drummer Makaya McCraven.
A singular artist with a warm, soul-drenched sound and an advanced command of composition, Hill accepted the prestigious Monk honor as an acknowledgment of a major career already in progress rather than the first spark from a neophyte, with four albums as a leader already under his belt, and a distinctive ensemble approach firmly established.
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MARC RIBOT 70TH BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION
with special guests James Brandon Lewis & Mary Halvorson & more…
Guitarist extraordinaire Marc Ribot follows his muse wherever it leads, resulting in a career path that has ranged across free jazz and no wave, rock and Cuban rumba. In some circles he’s best known as a key collaborator with singular artists such as Tom Waits, Elvis Costello, John Zorn, Diana Krall, and Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, contributing to their 2007 hit album Raising Sand.
The last time the mind-bogglingly eclectic checked into the SFJAZZ Center he played eight solo shows in the JHL, alternating between freely improvised sets, extended medleys of Haitian-American composer Frantz Casseus, Cuban maestro Arsenio Rodríguez and John Coltrane, and his gorgeous score for the 1924 Soviet silent film Aelita: Queen of Mars.
Celebrating his 70th birthday, Ribot joins forces with two of the most celebrated and searching jazz artists on the contemporary scene, guitarist Mary Halvorson and saxophonist James Brandon Lewis, along with bassist Hilliard Greene and longtime collaborator Chad Tayloron drums.
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