Sun Ra founded the Sun Ra Arkestra in Chicago in the mid-1950’s. Sun Ra was among the earliest pioneers of the synthesizer and the free jazz revolution of 1960’s. Sun Ra sent a strong spiritual and musical message to his Arkestra wanting them to help make the universe better through positive vibrations and music.

The Sun Ra Arkestra are known worldwide for their live shows that combine big-band swing, space-age free jazz, be-bop, singing, dancing, chanting and Afro-pageantry. The Arkestra has been at the forefront of Afro-futurism since their inception.

The Arkestra have recorded more than 100 albums. Their 2020 album “Swirling” was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Big Band Jazz Ensemble recording.

After more than 60 years the band continue to circle the globe on their Inter-Galactic tour. Recent highlights include shows at the Kennedy Center with Solange, The Berlin Opera House, the Burlington Jazz Festival and a New York City show at Radio City Music Hall.

Few bands have travelled this far – cosmically and musically.

“The possible has been tried and failed. Now it’s time to try the impossible.”

Sun Ra Space is the Place!

Apifera – Nitai Hershkovits, Yuvi Havkin, Amir Bresler and Yonatan Albalak – bring a melting pot of influences and experience to their second album Keep the Outside Open. When these different musicians come together, the effect is like switching between radio stations: a dash of prog, a twist of post-rock, and a heavy dose of psychedelia, with the members’ shared background in jazz tying it all together.

Keep the Outside Open came about organically, arising from the friends’ hangouts at Yuvi’s studio culminating in late-night smoke sessions spent laughing at dad jokes, goofy names for demos, and made-up words: “Bazooka” when the music is happy, “sweating at the gig” when the arrangement isn’t tight, and “slug” if things aren’t clicking.

Apifera’s Stones Throw debut Overstand was instrumental, but when it came to recording Keep The Outside Open,they felt closer than ever and ready to try a more intimate approach. They let their imaginations run wild, wrapping personal stories from everyday life within fantasy and fictional characters.

“Theodor Marmalade” tells the story of a curious fellow who escapes humanity in search of nature, only to find he now misses the energy of society. The band says: “We all grew up in cities and at some point got tired of them. There’s always a dream of leaving to some secluded spot, but once you’re there, you feel detached from society, however fucked up it is.” Other songs tell of encounters with talking machines (“Mr. Pullman”), searching for a cat called Iris who’s chasing a bat named Neil (“Iris Is Neil"), and childhood fear of the dark (“The Curious Wild”). Threaded throughout is Apifera’s belief in the healing power of nature: “life, even when it’s weird, somewhere there’s a tree I can hug”.

The band’s members all have deep roots in their musical community: Yuvi releases electronic jazz as Rejoicer; Yonatan is frontman for post-rock/psych jazz band Geshem; Amir’s group Liquid Saloon blends afrobeat with jazz funk; and Nitai is best known for his solo piano records, with a 2023 album on ECM (spot the nod to the label in Keep The Outside Open’s tracklist). They call on their friend, trumpeter Avishai Cohen, for the album’s closing track, “Sera Sam”.

Apifera’s new album title surfaced after “we’re closing the outside” was yelled after shows at their favorite local jazz club. They decided to give the words a “surreal twist” for the record: “Over the last few years, we’ve felt the walls closing on our everyday lives, our culture and music. Keep The Outside Open is a call for the world to be open. To return to its free and wild state.” Mindful that this is a heartbreaking time of violence and war, the band adds, “We do not support violence of any kind and can’t fathom how the world today could choose anything other than peace, but until such a time comes when humanity can transcend boundaries and conflicts, we are dedicated to the unifying power of music.”

In 2024 Boogarins have shown that their creative flourish got to a more mature but not less intense mood. After a US tour in the first semester celebrating the 10th anniversary of their first record the band took this tour to their home country and also kept doing some concerts with the set “Boogarins Toca Clube da Esquina'', a special homage where they show their true deep influences and infuse the band sound into brazilian classics from artists that are in this specific scene of 70’s Brazilian Music, like Milton Nascimento, Lô Borges, Beto Guedes and others. The band are now coming back for their second North America trip of the year, this time hitting up new cities and acclaimed festivals like Desert Daze, Levitation and Hipnosis in Mexico. For this second round, Boogarins promises a new record till December and concerts with new songs and their unforgettable vibrant stage energy.

Initially a lo-fi project from Goiânia, land of the Sertanejo (Brazil’s country music), Boogarins have become one of the most celebrated Brazilian rock acts internationally: charming audiences around the world with intense performances where their beautiful songs are immersed in sonic textures and improvisations that transcend the language barrier. The group began its journey in 2013 on the underground stages of their hometown Goiânia, when they released their first EP As Plantas Que Curam. It caught the ear of US label Fat Possum/Other Music who re-released the group’s home-recorded debut later that year, earning positive reviews in the New York Times, Pitchfork, Chicago Tribune and paving the way for greater recognition of the band in Brazil. The following year the band toured through Europe and the United States supporting acts like The Clean, Of Montreal, Guided By Voices and Neutral Milk Hotel. During those tours, Boogarins produced their second album, Latin Grammy nominee Manual (2015). Between 2016 and 2018, the band was based in Austin, Texas, and recorded extensively between tours, ultimately resulting in their next two albums, the conceptual Lá Vem a Morte (2017) and Sombrou Dúvida (2019), which took them to major festivals around the world such as Coachella, Desert Daze Rock In Rio, Paredes de Coura and their first performance in South Africa.

During Pandemic times, they got very active with digital releases, partnerships with new brazilian artists and music production workshops, releasing a two volume b-side compilation (Manchaca) and also presenting a six episode visual experience of their Sessões De Cura e Libertação (Healing and Liberation Sessions) – what the band call their free improvisation sets, sometimes presented as a compliment to their actual sets.

Recorded in the USA, the album features musical production by the artist, Pupillo, and Adrian Younge.

Céu discovered herself as a songwriter during a season in the Lower East Side of New York. In the early 2000s, influenced by the performances of black and Puerto Rican MCs on the neighborhood's streets, the budding interpreter was seized by an extreme freedom to express herself through her own music. This boldness is evident in her debut album, "Céu" (2005), a record nominated for both the Grammy Awards and the Latin Grammy Awards, featured on various charts worldwide and on Billboard, becoming one of the best-selling Brazilian albums in the history of the United States. This audacity continues to guide her unique transnational journey, acclaimed with renowned awards and, no less importantly, recognition from audiences who deeply resonate with her.

In 2023, Céu returned to the USA, this time to the West Coast, where she conceived "Novela" (Urban Jungle/ONErpm), her sixth album of unreleased songs in her career, set to be released on digital platforms on April 26th. Recorded at Linear Labs Studio in Los Angeles, the production is signed by the São Paulo-born artist, the musician and producer from Pernambuco, Pupillo – former drummer of Nação Zumbi, co-responsible for "Tropix" (2016) and "APKÁ!" (2019), both by Céu, winners of three Latin Grammy Awards, and a producer for Gal Costa and Erasmo Carlos - and by the American multi-instrumentalist and arranger Adrian Younge, owner of Linear Labs, known for albums such as "Something About April" (2011), and for projects with Snoop Dogg, Kendrick Lamar, The Delfonics, and Wu Tang Clan, as well as co-directing the multimedia initiative Jazz Is Dead.

As is customary in Adrian's work, the album was captured live, without the technological gadgets of today. Recorded on tape, in a dynamic moment that demands total presence. An old-fashioned approach that harkens back to the beginnings of character-forming record recordings. Interestingly, a futuristic experience that, according to Céu, requires a lot of emotional intelligence and no artificiality. "Nothing vintage," she assures. In the studio, the band consisted of Pupillo (on percussion, programming, and drums), Younge (on keyboards, guitar, bass - in "Reescreve" -, arrangements, and conducting strings and winds), and Lucas Martins (on bass - in virtually all tracks -, guitar, and co-authorship of three of the 12 tracks on the album).

"Dawned in your lucky color/ Chant your mantra and go/ Singing/ Living is for the brave," says the lyrics of "Raiou," which opens "Novela." American MC and songwriter, LadyBug Mecca, from Digable Planets, whose parents are Brazilian, shares vocals with Céu. In "Gerando na alta," it's the turn of anaiis, a Franco-Senegalese singer and songwriter, based in London, England, to exchange impressions about sisterhood. Loren Oden and Jensine Benitez, singers from the USA, feature on "Into my Novela," a collaboration between Céu and Lucas Martins, the informal title track of the album, which talks about the teledrama of everyday life, where there are no TV cameras recording actions, nor predefined scripts. "I am the protagonist of my Novela/ So good, yeah baby/ I want to learn how you want me/ To love you."

There are other significant characters in the plot. Frankie Reyes, an American DJ and producer of Puerto Rican descent, contributes to the harmony of the track "Buá Buá," where Céu, the owner of the melody and lyrics, says: "Cry all the tears that one day/ You refused to cry/ Cry because you recognize/ That you won't find one of these." Hervé Salters, a French artist and leader of General Elektriks, co-producer of "Tropix," appears on "High na Cachú," whose verses by Céu say: "Cold sweet water makes me reborn/ While the stone calls me back to sit/ Retaining all the heat it kept from the sun/ I settle like a flower pollinating." Marcos Valle, a national treasure from Rio de Janeiro, co-wrote "Reescreve" with the São Paulo-born artist, which, at the end of the affectionate session, questions the perspective of colonizers in Brazilian history textbooks. "What was there/ I never believed in/ Every page I read/ Just made me more sleepy/ Since the peoples who were silenced/ The embers came to burn/ The truth comes to light/ It's too much material to work with." Before that, "Corpo e colo," the only track by third parties, is the result of the encounter between Nando Reis and Kleber Lucas. Recently, on social media, the award-winning gospel artist and pastor of Igreja Batista Soul, in Rio, celebrated the fact. "Another beauty coming. Beautiful partnership I made with my bro Nando Reis. I just received a preview of him singing and I am simply ecstatic," he said.

In "Novela," ancient technologies, healing, creaminess, bolero, polished stars, echoes of soul music, things of the earth, rap, and whispers to guides emerge. Throughout the record, there is a reaffirmation of the author's fearlessness, committed to her time, in the complexity and beauty of creative work. Always keeping the diversity of Brazilian music on the horizon. Stay tuned for exciting scenes from the next chapters.

DELVON LAMARR ORGAN TRIO—or as it is sometimes referred to, DLO3—specializes in the lost art of “feel-good music.” The precise sequence of music chosen by Delvon is unique in itself, as he creates an experience for each show based on the vibe and feel of that audience. This includes the 1960s organ jazz stylings of Jimmy Smith and Baby Face Willette, a tweak of the snappy soul strut of Booker T. & The M.G.’s, and The Meters. It teases you with Motown, Stax Records, Blues, and many other styles that may surprise you. It’s a concoction that goes straight to your heart and soul, leaving you emotionally connected on a whole new level.

The band features organist Delvon Lamarr, a self-taught virtuosic musician with perfect pitch who taught himself jazz and has effortlessly been able to play many instruments. The trio is formed by collecting a unique blend of guitarists and drummers worldwide. They leave you with a feeling of wonder caused by seeing something surprisingly beautiful and unforgettable for their fans at every show.

DLO3 was formed from the ground up by Delvon’s wife and manager, Amy Novo, together they created feel-good music to heal the world. The trio started from humble beginnings in 2015 and has since released several Billboard charting albums and toured the world to sold-out venues. Today, the power couple has taken the Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio beyond their wildest dreams through her tireless work ethic and his bottomless talent.

The trio started from humble beginnings in 2015, but since then has released several Billboard charting albums and toured the world to sold-out venues. Not to mention, Congratulations to Delvon Lamarr on being named the Rising Star Critics Choice for Organist of the Year! Check out the 70th Annual Downbeat Critics Poll.

TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY, MAY 17TH @ 10A PST.

To hear Kiefer live is to hear him in his element, and to hear that dynamic with his trio creates a whole new atmosphere for anyone lucky enough to witness.Something For Real, Kiefer’s first official live album, features audio captured during an intimate show in Los Angeles back in April of 2023. The show was recorded in secret, per Kiefer’s request– thus capturing a natural electricity between him and his trio, consisting of collaborators Luke Titus and Pera Krstajic. The project includes one brand new song in title track “Something For Real,” along with originals from Kiefer’s catalog and a stirring rendition of Bobby Hutcherson’s “Montara”. This live album was conceived as a project without rules: “three friends playing for each other, for fun. With friends, for friends. Something for real!”

The album follows the release of Kiefer’s triumphant NPR Tiny Desk on May 6th– with support from his trio (Luke Titus, Pera Krstajic), and surprise guest appearances by supremely talented friends Charlie Hunter, Nate Smith, CARRTOONS, and Theo Croker.

Kiefer’s first release with Stones Throw was the 2016 album Happysad. His most recent album was last year’s It’s Ok, B U – a record that saw Kiefer return to his beat-making roots. In addition to his solo work, Kiefer has produced, played, and written for artists including Drake and Anderson .Paak, winning a Grammy for his work with the latter. 

Kiefer recently completed two sold out nights with this trio at the famed Blue Note NYC, and will tour Asia this summer. He’ll also accompany Nate Smith and CARRTOONS across the US in May. 

At a night at The Ford in Los Angeles, a stellar lineup awaits, featuring jazz luminaries like Gary Bartz and members of the Blackbyrds alongside rising talents Melanie Charles and Katalyst. Among the esteemed performers gracing the stage is Larry Mizell, one half of the legendary Mizell brothers who reshaped the landscape of jazz-funk with their innovative productions under Sky High Productions. Hailing from Englewood, New Jersey, Larry and Alphonso “Fonce” Mizell embarked on a musical journey rooted in their  adolescence, eventually leaving an indelible mark on the music industry with their fusion of jazz and R&B. From their early days mimicking horn lines to their collaborations with Motown and jazz icons like Donald Byrd, the Mizell brothers' influence continues to resonate, shaping the soundscape of contemporary music and earning them a well-deserved place among the pantheon of musical innovators.

The Mizell brothers, Larry and Alphonso “Fonce” Mizell, are iconic figures who revolutionized jazz-funk with their innovative productions under Sky High Productions. Together the duo produced tracks for Bobbi Humphrey, Donald Byrd, Johnny Hammond, The Jackson 5, Edwin Starr, Gary Bartz, Mary Wells, A Taste of Honey and more. 

Born and raised in Englewood, New Jersey, their musical journey began in their adolescence, mimicking horn lines from their parents' records and eventually forming the jazz-harmony quartet the Vanlords during their time at Howard University. After graduating, Larry worked briefly as an engineer while Fonce and their friend Freddie Perren made their mark in Los Angeles, eventually joining Motown as staff songwriters. Their collaboration with Motown, including writing and producing hits for the Jackson 5, propelled them to fame. However, disillusioned with Motown's constraints, they ventured into jazz with Donald Byrd, releasing groundbreaking albums like "Black Byrd" and "Street Lady," which defined their signature fusion of jazz and R&B. Throughout the 1970s, they continued to produce influential works across genres, leaving an enduring legacy in music. Despite a hiatus in the 1980s, their productions remain influential, particularly in hip-hop, and their contributions were celebrated with a compilation release by Blue Note Records in 2005.

TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY 4/26/24 @ 10A MT.

A highly-respected trumpeter born in Kobe, Japan, Takuya Kuroda is a forward-thinking musician that has developed a unique hybrid sound, blending soulful jazz, funk, post-bop, fusion and hip hop music.

After following the footsteps of his trombonist brother playing in big bands, he relocated to New York to study jazz & contemporary music at The New School in Union Square; a course he graduated from in the mid- noughties. It was here that Takuya met vocalist José James, with whom he worked on the ‘Blackmagic’ and ‘No Beginning No End’ projects.

Following graduation, Takuya established himself further in the NYC jazz scene, performing with the likes of Akoya Afrobeat and in recent years with DJ Premier’s BADDER band (also including acclaimed bass player, Brady Watt). Premier said “The BADDER Band project was put together by my manager, and an agent I’ve known since the beginning of my Gang Starr career. He said, ‘What if you put a band together that revolved around a trumpet player from Japan named Takuya Kuroda? He’s got a hip-hop perspective and respect in the jazz field…”

Takuya Kuroda is already incredibly prolific, releasing five albums in the past decade and fortifying a solid reputation in the global jazz scene. 2011 saw the release of Takuya’s independently-produced debut album, ‘Edge’, followed by ‘Bitter and High’ the following year and ‘Six Aces’ on P-Vine in 2013. Takuya was signed to the legendary Blue Note Records in 2014 for his album ‘Rising Son’, as well as appearing on their 2019 cover versions project, ‘Blue Note Voyage’. He released his 5th album ‘Zigzagger’ on Concord in 2016, which also featured Antibalas on a reimagining of the Donald Byrd classic ‘Think Twice’.

Late Summer 2020, Takuya Kuroda returns with his sixth album ‘Fly Moon Die Soon’. In his words, “this album is about the irony between the greatness of nature and the beautiful obsceneness of humanity. Melodies and grooves fly back and forth from being spiritual to being vulgar.”

Tickets go on sale Friday, May 3rd!

Irreversible Entanglements (IE) is a free-jazz quintet with an experimental punk mentality, that consists of poet/vocalist Camae Ayewa (often known as Moor Mother), bassist Luke Stewart, trumpeter Aquiles Navarro, saxophonist Keir Neuringer, and drummer Tcheser Holmes.

It is a community band playing deeply improvised, rhythm music full of love and social commitment. IE came together spontaneously, organically, in April of 2015 at "Musicians Against Police Brutality," a day of protest sound and discussion in Brooklyn. All were artists and activists of varying degrees: Philadelphia-based Ayewa and Neuringer, and D.C.-based Stewart as veterans of the Mid-Atlantic noisehardcore-experimental scene, while Holmes and Navarro as recent New England Conservatory grads Each of the studio albums that followed — 2020's Who Sent You? and 2021's Open The Gates — developed this legend further.

In 2023, IE signed to the fabled Impulse! Records, and released its most accomplished work to date, Protect Your Light, on September 8, 2023, primarily recorded at New Jersey's historic Van Gelder Studios. It features eight examples of how IE's collaborative composition strategies and Ayewa's in-communion verses result in some of the most potent music being made in the third decade of the 21st century, music with communal light and love at its heart. Get to that love on time — don't force history to guide you.

Giacomo Turra is an Italian musician born in 1997. Intrigued byf his father’s vinyl record collection, Giacomo started playing guitar at the age of 13, learning by jamming on his favorite artists like Stevie Wonder, George Benson and Herbie Hancock.

In 2018, he started his solo musical project, exploring R&B, Funk and Jazz and releasing his first singles under the name JMT between 2019 and 2020. In March 2020, during the pandemic lockdown, Giacomo started posting video performances on his Instagram account, soon becoming an Artist for D'Angelico Guitars and gaining hundreds of thousands of followers.

In July 2021, Giacomo released "The Groove Sessions", a compilation of Funk and R&B covers recorded with renowned musicians and singers from all over the world like Brandon "TAZ" Niederauer, Phoebe Katis, Jessica Burdeaux, George Collins and Augie Bello.

In February 2023, Giacomo announced the release of his signature Envelope Filter pedal in collaboration with Canadian brand SolidgoldFX. Later that month, Giacomo and his band played two sold out shows at The Zone in Tel Aviv, Israel and through the next months of the same year, he has been invited to perform at the famous JavaJazz Festival in Indonesia, as one of the very few international acts to perform there. Last but not least Giacomo and his band toured for over a month in North America where he collected several sold-out shows before coming back to Europe to launch his first European Tour ever.

MUST BE AGE 21+ FOR ADMISSION.

There is no wrong time to play 'Bam Bam.' Every summer belongs to 'Bam Bam.'... A perfect song. The New Yorker In the words of her iconic 1982 single Bam Bam, Sister Nancy is one inna three million, an artist whose talents truly come from creation. Regarded as the first female star in the male-dominated world of Jamaican dancehall, Sister Nancy continues to blaze new trails 35 years after the release of her first and only album. Recently recognized by Pitchfork as The Best Dancehall Song of All-Time, Bam Bam has been sampled, quoted and referenced in tracks by Lauryn Hill, Wiz Khalifa, Too Short, Kanye West and Jay-Z.

Born Ophlin Russell, Nancy grew up in Kingston, Jamaica Papine district, in a large family that included dancehall pioneeR&Brigadier Jerry. Her familial ties afforded her an opportunity granted few, if any, Jamaican girls at the time: To deejay (or chat) songs on sound Systems, the local DJ crews that form the backbone of dancehall culture. After learning of her talents from artist General Echo, Winston Riley of Kingston storied Techniques Records label brought her into the studio to record her first single, Papa Dean, in 1979. Returning to the studio to complete what would be her first and only album, One Two, in 1982, Nancy lent her voice to a haunting, minimalist version of Riley Stalag riddim, a popular instrumental track voiced by countless artists since 1973. Co-opting a lyrical refrain (Bam bam bi lam, bam bam, what a bam bam) from Toots the Maytals identically-named 1966 hit, Nancy created an anth of female powerment, repurposing the skepticism she encountered as the lone woman on the sound syst circuit into a supremely-confident mission statement. One Two, the title cut from her album, would become her signature hit in Jamaica, leading to international tours and collaborations with dancehall then-reigning king, Yellowman. Little heard at the time of its release, Bam Bam would find its audience in New York, first in the city Caribbean Diaspora and then in hip-hop.

In the early 1990s, it was sampled by golden-era rap acts Main Source and Pete Rock CL Smooth, and r ixed into a hip-hop version by legendary radio DJ Stretch Armstrong. It wasnt until Nancy herself relocated to New Jersey, where she would take a job as a bank accountant, later in the decade that she became aware of her song and her own iconic stateside status. Hype Williams 1998 film Belly c ented Nancy place in the pop culture canon, in an unforgettable scene in which Bam Bam soundtracks the movements of the stunning Jamaican feme fatale, Chiquita. That same year, Lauryn Hill echoed Nancy Bam Bam chorus on Lost Ones, from her Grammy-winning and career-defining album, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, passing Nancy patois inflections on to a new generation of listeners. Since then, the samples, covers and plac ents including a 2014 Reebok TV campaign featuring model Miranda Kerr have become ever more frequent. In 2016, Nancy received the ultimate co-sign, or at least some really great exposure, when Kanye West used Bam Bam prominently on Famous, arguably the most controversial song and video of his always-provocative career. The New Yorkers Carrie Battan went so far as to dub Bam Bam the Song of the Summer for 2016, describing it as a perfect song and a reggae classic that only grows more lustrous with age.

Multifaceted American jazz pianist and composer Emmet Cohen is one of his generation's pivotal figures in music and the related arts. Leader of the Emmet Cohen Trio and creator of the Masters  Legacy Series, he is an internationally acclaimed jazz artist, a dedicated educator, the winner of the 2019 American Pianists Awards, and a finalist in the 2011 Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition. Cohen headlines regularly at Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Village Vanguard, and Birdland, and has appeared at the Newport, Monterey, and North Sea jazz festivals. His artistry has taken him to venues and festivals in over 30 countries. Cohen's entrepreneurial energies led to his developing "Live From Emmet's Place," a live-streamed "Harlem rent party" that unites a worldwide  audience via tens of millions of internet views.

“When Cohen is in full flight, with Poole slamming the kit around the room behind him, he reminds me of Ahmad Jamal: not the genteel Jamal you hear on record, but the wall-banging, holy-shit Jamal I saw in concert a few years ago, who rolled across the keyboard like a thunderstorm.” — PHIL FREEMAN, STEREOGUM

Nate Smith is a drummer, composer, & producer from Chesapeake, Virginia. His visceral, instinctive, and deep-rooted style of drumming has led to three GRAMMY® nominations and work with esteemed artists, including: Pat Metheny, Dave Holland, Brittany Howar’d, Van Hunt, The Fearless Flyers, Norah Jones, and Somi. Smith fuses his original compositions with an eclectic mix of music, including everything from jazz to R&B to hip-hop to pop. His latest album, Kinfolk 2: See The Birds (released September 2021 on Edition Records) is the highly- anticipated follow up to his 2017 GRAMMY® Award-nominated album, Kinfolk: Postcards From Everywhere. In recent years, Smith’s viral videos have been viewed by millions of people, underscoring his popularity as one of the most influential drummers of his generation.

This will be Nate’s second time performing live at Jazz Is Dead and we can’t wait to see what he brings to the stage this time around!

Born in Beirut in 1980, Ibrahim Maalouf is currently a popular instrumentalist in the French music scene and one of the most recognized internationally. His genre-crossing work has led him to fill Istanbul’s Volkswagen Arena, sell out the Lincoln Jazz Center in New York, or perform at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC, and travel to over 40 countries around the world.

In 2016, he became the first jazz musician in history to fill France’s largest concert hall, the Paris Bercy Arena, selling out 8 months in advance for a historic show. “The virtuoso” according to The New York Times, has received 2 “Victoires du Jazz”, 2 “Victoires de la Musique” (making him the first and only instrumentalist to be awarded in the history of this ceremony), an “Echo Jazz” in Germany, a “César for Best Film Music”, a “Prix Lumières” for Best Film Music, as well as honorary awards of Knight of the Order of Merit and Knight of Arts and Letters.

As a teenager, Ibrahim was already winning major international classical music competitions and starting a solo career. In the 2000s, he became essential in pop, jazz as well as the “World” music scene. Sting, Salif Keita, Amadou & Mariam, Tryo, Matthieu Chédid, Lhasa de Sela, and many artists of very diverse styles call on him.

Between 2007 and 2023, Ibrahim produced, composed, arranged, and directed more than 20 albums for himself and other artists. He also composed more than 10 symphonic pieces and twenty movie scores.

In 2017, Quincy Jones Productions became his representative in the United States, and his North American career took off anew. The American Media’s reviews of his album “Queen of Sheba” – in a duet with the Beninese singer Angélique Kidjo – are rapturous. “The most interesting album of the year” according to the legendary magazine Spin, “Without a doubt one of the most important world music albums of the year” according to Glide Magazine, another leading American music magazine.

In 2022, Ibrahim composed the soundtrack for “Reste un peu” by Gad Elmaleh. One of the greatest French directors, Claude Lelouch, offered him to compose the music for his 51st feature film.

Meanwhile, Ibrahim has never stopped expressing his love for the trumpet and improvisation. In 2022, he relaunched after 17 years of absence, and with the support of the Ministry of Culture, the Maurice André International Trumpet Competition, thus putting the name of the man who was his father’s teacher and a true mentor, at the center of French cultural media interest.

In 2021, Ibrahim released a book entitled “Petite philosophie de l’improvisation” and initiated “Improbox”, a radio program on TSF Jazz that highlights the importance and place of improvisation in all professions. He sees himself as an activist for the reintegration of improvisation into musical learning as well as national education.

Ibrahim Maalouf is an artist who is committed. He was present alongside Sting during the reopening of The Bataclan, as well as the funeral of Tignous, one of the cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo, and composed a tribute song in tribute to the victims of the 2015 attacks, sung by Louane, written by his uncle Amin Maalouf, and performed with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France.

On July 15, 2021, Ibrahim performed a personalized version of La Marseillaise in front of 6 million viewers and 500,000 people gathered on the Champs de Mars. He also stays close to his country of origin, Lebanon. In 2020, he organized a major fundraising concert at the Olympia, broadcasted on France 2 and all Lebanese television channels to help Lebanon after the explosion at the port of Beirut. Donations exceeded 2 million euros.

A highly-respected trumpeter born in Kobe, Japan, Takuya Kuroda is a forward-thinking musician that has developed a unique hybrid sound, blending soulful jazz, funk, post-bop, fusion and hip hop music.

After following the footsteps of his trombonist brother playing in big bands, he relocated to New York to study jazz & contemporary music at The New School in Union Square; a course he graduated from in the mid- noughties. It was here that Takuya met vocalist José James, with whom he worked on the ‘Blackmagic’ and ‘No Beginning No End’ projects.

Following graduation, Takuya established himself further in the NYC jazz scene, performing with the likes of Akoya Afrobeat and in recent years with DJ Premier’s BADDER band (also including acclaimed bass player, Brady Watt). Premier said “The BADDER Band project was put together by my manager, and an agent I’ve known since the beginning of my Gang Starr career. He said, ‘What if you put a band together that revolved around a trumpet player from Japan named Takuya Kuroda? He’s got a hip-hop perspective and respect in the jazz field…”

Takuya Kuroda is already incredibly prolific, releasing five albums in the past decade and fortifying a solid reputation in the global jazz scene. 2011 saw the release of Takuya’s independently-produced debut album, ‘Edge’, followed by ‘Bitter and High’ the following year and ‘Six Aces’ on P-Vine in 2013. Takuya was signed to the legendary Blue Note Records in 2014 for his album ‘Rising Son’, as well as appearing on their 2019 cover versions project, ‘Blue Note Voyage’. He released his 5th album ‘Zigzagger’ on Concord in 2016, which also featured Antibalas on a reimagining of the Donald Byrd classic ‘Think Twice’.

Late Summer 2020, Takuya Kuroda returns with his sixth album ‘Fly Moon Die Soon’. In his words, “this album is about the irony between the greatness of nature and the beautiful obsceneness of humanity. Melodies and grooves fly back and forth from being spiritual to being vulgar.”

TICKETS ON SALE FRIDAY, OCTOBER 20TH.

Bassekou Kouyate was born in Garana, a small and multi-ethnic village 60 km from Segou located at the banks of the Niger river. He is descended from a long line of griots on both sides.

In the mid eighties Bassekou started playing the traditional sumu circuit, which soon put him in touch with another extraordinary musician such as the kora player Toumani Diabate. At the end of the 1980s, Bassekou became a founding member of Toumani Diabate’s Symmetric Orchestra, which then included among others a young Habib Koite as lead singer. It was the Symmetric Trio that brought Bassekou to Europe for the first time to play at the festival in Dranouter in Belgium in 1990.

Later that same year, Bassekou made his first trip to the USA, where he met the African American blues musician, Taj Mahal.

In the mid 1990s Bassekou married Amy Sacko, a fine griot singer originally from northwest Mali. As a couple, they produced a number of popular cassettes and were in constant demand on the wedding circuit and on Mali television, where Amy was nicknamed “the Tina Turner of Mali”.

In 2005 Bassekou was invited by Mali’s “desert bluesman” Ali Farka Touré to play on his album ‘Savane’ and to join Ali on stage for his final tour in the summer of 2005. In the same year Bassekou decided to create his band Ngoni ba. a quartet of different sized ngonis. It was a novel idea, but it was also very old – the rulers of precolonial Segu sometimes had bands of up to 30 or 40 ngoni players, all playing together.

Since than Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni ba have toured the world playing 100rds of shows from NY Central Park to the Royal Albert Hall in London, from Roskilde to Glastonbury.

Lately he performed with Africa Express and charged stages with musicians like Sir Paul McCartney, John Paul Jones, Damon Albarn and many more.

Miles Davis once quipped, “I’ll play it first and tell you what it is later.” Butcher Brown has released forward-thinking and expansive hybrids of jazz and hip-hop since 2013. Today, they have an apt descriptor for their songs: solar music. Drawing inspiration from every sound under the sun, the Richmond, VA band adds elements of funk, soul, and rock to their foundational mix. The result is a Southern-leaning, sometimes psychedelic fusion that feels fresh yet familiar. Simultaneously working within and defying genre conventions, Butcher Brown is a jazz festival mainstay that could tour with Tyler, the Creator as easily as Khruangbin.

“We get daps from the jazz cats, the rap scene, the indie scene, and everyone else,” says drummer Corey Fonville. Every Butcher Brown album, show, and improvisational leap therein stems from the synergy, vision, and inexhaustible musical curiosity of him and his bandmates: producer/multi-instrumentalist DJ Harrison; bassist/composer Andrew Randazzo; trumpeter/saxophonist/MC Marcus “Tennishu” Tenney; and guitarist Morgan Burrs.

Surrealist blues poet and community organizer aja monet has announced her debut album when the poems do what they do. As previewed by the recently released piece “the devil you know,” and the newly shared “castaway,” the album’s thematic origins center around Black resistance, love, and the inexhaustible quest for joy. She is joined on her journey by a potent roster of esteemed musicians, including Chief Xian aTunde AdjuahFKA Christian Scott (trumpet), Samora Pinderhughes (piano), Elena Pinderhughes (flute), Luques Curtis (bass), Weedie Braimah (percussion), and Marcus Gilmore (drums). Featuring additional vocals by bluesman Lonnie Holley, soul singer  Eryn Allen Kane, DJ & host  Novena Carmel and more. The songs throughout are insistent and unrelenting, with some reminiscent of jazz club virtuosity and melee while others act as a healing balm in gilead, moving like that of the call to intercessory prayer. The album is a potent demonstration of her indefatigable commitment to speak, her poems manifesting as a work of gravity that move constantly between origin and outcome, allowing them to exist in converse. 

As a community organizer, poet, and teacher aja monet moves between mediums, each one an element to her writing. Organizing and activism manifest as part of a process toward liberation, with the poems, the music, and the art serving as the scribe of the time. Building off oratorical traditions, aja is the conduit for her predecessors to channel through. At any given time you’ll find the revolutionary spirit of Audre Lorde and the Last Poets, you’ll feel June Jordan, Amiri Baraka, Jayne Cortez and even the expressive ephemerality of a passing blue note. She has been a poet since youth, “I started writing when I was 8 or 9 — [but] I think I was a poet before I wrote my first poem.” She cut her teeth within the walls of the legendary Nuyorican Poets Café, where she won the title of Grand Slam Champion in 2007 at age 19, making her the youngest Grand Slam Champion in the venue’s history. After graduating from Sarah Lawrence College and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and living briefly in Paris, aja co-edited Chorus: A Literary Mixtape alongside poet-actor-director Saul Williams and published her first full length book of poetry called My Mother was A Freedom Fighter with Haymarket Books. 

On when the poems do what they do aja monet appears as a woman of letters and storm, her poems do not roar in pentameter – but rather in storm surge because, “Who’s got time for poems when the world is on fire?!.” aja monet is a griot, a storyteller, a chronicler, and your grandmother telling you about her first love all at once. These aren’t poems for poets, but poems for everyone. When you reach the end of this album, you are left with a similar feeling you get when heartbroken, the gravity of barrelling back down to earth, sopping wet with tears, out of breath, overcome with love, despair, hope, and all too aware that all of this, is over far too soon. When the poems do what they do, they do absolutely everything. 

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Theon Cross is one of those rare musicians whose vision has redefined their instrument. His unique approach to the tuba has expanded the instrument’s sonic possibilities in revolutionary fashion, restoring it to a long-forgotten prominence as a crucial part of the contemporary jazz ensemble. Through his combination of technical mastery, studio smarts, deep musical knowledge and expansive vision, the power and originality of Theon’s playing has reinvented the tuba’s place in modern music.
His most recent album, Intra-I (meaning ‘Within Self’) released in 2021 synthesizes the diversity of his musical art and experience to deliver an essential message to a world gripped by tribulation. Across ten sonically divergent and bass-rich tracks, Intra-I explores themes of self-reliance, origins, identity and more. Since its release he has contributed a version of Monk’s Epistrophy for Blue Note Re:Imagined II, been a core part of Miles Davis channeling collective London Brew and featured on Matthew Herbert’s single The Horse Has A Voice. He has also released his first 7” single Wings b/w a version of Aswad’s Back to Africa.

He completed his first tour of North America in October 2022 with a combination of headline shows and supports for Makaya McCraven. This year will see him play multiple live dates in solo, duo and band configurations across the UK, Europe, North and South America.

Pianist and producer Jamael Dean is a harmonically sophisticated pianist with a bent toward expansive, boundary-pushing jazz and hip-hop. A gifted player since his teens, he emerged in the 2010s in Los Angeles, playing with Kamasi Washington, Thundercat, and his grandfather, drummer Donald Dean, before issuing his 2019 Stones Throw debut, Black Space Tapes.

Born in 1998 in Bakersfield, California, Dean was introduced to music at a young age and initially started out on violin while in the third grade. At age nine, he was given a keyboard and soon began teaching himself how to play by ear. Under the guidance of Les McCann and Yusef Lateef drummer Donald Dean, he became interested in jazz and spent much of his adolescence mentoring and playing gigs with the elder Dean. His talent also caught the attention of players on the greater Los Angeles jazz scene, including saxophonist Kamasi Washington and bassist/singer Thundercat; both of whom took him on tour while he was still in high school. He began expanding his interests, crafting electronic beats on his computer and merging jazz, funk, and hip-hop. Following high school, he enrolled as a Jazz Performance major at the New School in New York City. In 2019, he released his debut album, the genre-bending Black Space Tapes on Stones Throw.