JAZZ SERIES Friday, January 25, at 8 p.m. J A Z Z S E R I ES
MONTEREY JAZZ FESTIVAL ON TOUR
Official Partners
Dee Dee Bridgewater, vocals Christian McBride, bass, musical director Ambrose Akinmusire, trumpet Chris Potter, tenor and soprano saxophones Benny Green, piano Lewis Nash, drums TM
Selections to be announced from the stage.
ABOUT THE PROGRAM Monterey is one of the longest running jazz festivals in the world. The dream of founder Jimmy Lyons became reality in 1958, when the first Monterey Jazz Festival featured artists like Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, John Lewis, Sonny Rollins, Gerry Mulligan, Max Roach and Billie Holiday. Monterey Jazz Festival on Tour 55th Anniversary celebrates the festival’s legacy of expanding the boundaries of live jazz presentation. The show reflects Monterey’s “traditional-untraditionalist” attitude, as well as the jazz-with-a-purpose exuberance and joyful fun that continue to be the hallmarks of the Festival to this day.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS DEE DEE BRIDGEWATER, vocals Over the course of a career spanning four decades, Dee Dee Bridgewater has put her unique spin on standards and has taken intrepid leaps of faith in re-envisioning jazz classics. Her latest recording,
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Eleanora Fagan (1915-1959): To Billie With Love From Dee Dee, honors Billie Holiday, an iconic jazz figure who died tragically at the age of 44 a half-century ago. “This album is my way of paying my respect to a vocalist who made it possible for singers like me to carve out a career for ourselves,” says Bridgewater, who performed the role of Holiday in the triumphant theatrical production Lady Day, which was staged in Paris and London in 1986 and 1987. Bridgewater has previously paid homage to other monumental figures of the music world, including Ella Fitzgerald, Horace Silver and Kurt Weil, but with Eleanora Fagan, Bridgewater delivers one of the most remarkable recording performances of her career. Instead of playing it safe and recreating her performance in Lady Day, on Eleanora Fagan Bridgewater reacquaints herself with Holiday, shining a new ray of love on the oftenmisunderstood jazz icon. “I wanted the record to be a collection that would not be like the music of the show,” she says. That philosophy is in keeping with Bridgewater’s approach to all of her projects: “I want to move forward, just as I’ve done with each of my albums. To not go backwards, but progress. Constantly.”