Jazz Police - Delfeayo Marsalis Salutes Louis Armstrong With All-Star Band, April 17th

On April 17th, acclaimed trombonist/ producer Delfeayo Marsalis returns to Orchestra Hall with a dream band in tribute to Louis Armstrong. Over the past year, Marsalis has performed several times in the Twin Cities, at the Dakota, Orchestral Hall and as guest artist with the local student ensemble, the Dakota Combo. The Armstrong tribute will feature a stellar cast of musicians. In addition to Marsalis, the band includes Nicholas Payton, trumpet; Victor Goines, tenor saxophone and clarinet; Bill Charlap, piano; Reginald Veal, bass; Herlin Riley, drums; and Kermit Ruffins, vocals and trumpet. Of special interest to Twin Cities audiences will be the guest appearance of local vocalist Charmin Michelle.

A middle brother of the Marsalis Clan, Delfeayo has largely stayed in the background over the past decade, playing sideman to the late Elvin Jones and others, and concentrating on an impressive career as a Grammy-nominated record producer. Growing up in New Orleans, Delfeayo initially “dabbled with drums a little and it wasn’t my thing, and then the bass, but it hurt my fingers.” When he settled on the trombone at age 13, it was a perfect fit. “The trombone was meant for me,” says Delfeayo, “it fit my personality. The job of the trombone is to make sure everyone gets along, that the trumpet and sax get along. The trumpet is the lead in a New Orleans band, and the sax’s job is to make the trumpet sound good; and the trombone makes sure both of them sound good!” After attending high school at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts, Marsalis went on to the Berklee College of Music to study performance and production. He received additional classical training through the Eastern Music Festival and Tanglewood Institute; and he recently earned an MA degree in jazz performance from the University of Louisville.

Delfeayo Marsalis©Andrea Canter

In addition to the strong influences of brothers Wynton and Branford, Delfeayo cites J.J. Johnson in particular among trombonists (“his clarity of attack”), but also Al Grey, Tyree Glynn, Jack Teagarden, Tommy Dorsey and Curtis Fuller. Fuller’s flexibility inspired Delfeayo, who also notes that Fuller “was responsible for providing the trombone sound in modern context. J.J. led his own groups, so he dictated what he would play, while Curtis would walk into a session and get the music down.” Marsalis’ early touring experiences included stints with Ray Charles, Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, Max Roach, and Abdullah Ibrahim, as well as Elvin Jones' Jazz Machine. More recently he has appeared with Branford and on Monty Alexander’s Concrete Jungle. Yet he only released two recordings as leader prior to his 2006 Minion’s Dominion (Troubadour Jazz), including Pontius Pilate’s Decision in 1992 (RCA) and Musashi (King Records) in 1997. Unlike many musicians who turn to production later in their careers, often to gain more control over their music, Delfeayo’s first priority for many years was producing music for others, and he was already heading projects at 17. Producing over 100 releases since the 1980s (including projects for Wynton and Branford, and for Harry Connick, Terence Blanchard, Marcus Roberts, Eric Reed and Nicholas Payton), he’s garnered several Grammy awards and nominations.

Delfeayo Marsalis is also an accomplished composer and educator. Among music scores, his works have included the backdrop for the ABC mini-series, Moon Over Miami, the documentaries Streetcar Mysteries and 112th & Central, an off-Broadway production, Girl Gone, and the New Orleans Ballet presentations of Tennessee Williams’ Streetcar Named Desire and Glass Menagerie. And the majority of tracks on Minion’s Dominion are original compositions. As a committed jazz educator, he has served as Director of the Foundation for Artistic and Musical Excellence summer program in Lawrenceville, NJ, and founded the Uptown Music Theatre, created specifically to provide 8th-12th grade youth with musical theatre training.

Charmin Michelle©Andrea Canter

Whether in tribute to Ella or Billie, in duo or fronting a big band, Minneapolis vocalist Charmin Michelle sings with “taste and understatement, swing and savoir faire, grace and grooves, intimacy and panache” (TC Music Net). And she is also among the busiest—and most versatile-- singers in town. After more than a decade charming local audiences as well as occasional forays across the Atlantic, these days Charmin is making that trans-Atlantic flight as a regular gig, her bookings in Spain coming whenever she can fit travel around her local dates with Joel Shapira (as Charmin & Shapira), Denny Malmberg at Kozy’s and Fireside Pizza, Jerry O’Hagan’s Orchestra at the Cinema Ballroom, Doug Haining’s Twin Cities Seven, and more.

Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Charmin Michelle moved to Minneapolis as a young child. With the promotion of organ legend “Captain” Jack McDuff, she toured Europe with internationally known pianists Mulgrew Miller and Kirk Lightsey in 1997, and since 1998, has performed in jazz festivals in Spain, Portugal and France (with the Tuxedo Big Band) as well as throughout the Twin Cities area. On her first three recordings—Your Eyes (1994,out of print), Destination Moon (1998, CM), and Hot (2001, CM), she covered tunes of Billie Holiday, the Great American Songbook, blues and bossa, what Tom Surowicz described as an “aural charm bracelet.” In 2005, she and Joel Shapira released Pure Imagination (CharmSongs), a combination of voice/guitar duets and quintet arrangements of jazz classics.

Phil Schaap, noted curator for Jazz at Lincoln Center and host for the evening, will present a pre-concert lecture/Q & A session at 6 pm. In a semi-staged drama, Kermit Ruffins portrays Armstrong’s life story, integrated with instrumental renditions of “West End Blues,” “What a Wonderful World,” “Mack the Knife” and more.

This evening focused on the life and music of Louis Armstrong offers a rare opportunity to hear an octet of some of the most acclaimed performers in jazz today as well as one of the Twin Cities’ own modern legend of song.

Get tickets now for “A Tribute to Louis Armstrong” directed by Delfeayo Marsalis on April 17, 7:30 pm. Tickets $45/$65. FFI, 612-371-5656.