Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra & Wynton Marsalis

Welcome to the 20th Klarafestival!

Under the title We Are Now, this special anniversary edition pays tribute to the here and now. No one embraces the magic of the moment more fearlessly than festival artist Patricia Kopatchinskaja. Wherever and whatever she plays, this Moldovan violinist and composer sets the stage alight. For her, every concert is a new beginning, a full moment in which anything can happen. Klarafestival 2025 paints a multifaceted portrait of Patricia Kopatchinskaja as a violinist, composer and inspiring presence.

In honour of our 20th anniversary, we are launching a new tradition: for one day, Mont des Arts will be transformed into the Muziekberg /Mont des Musiques. Alongside concerts and performances at various venues, a new ensemble will also see the light. Sound of Brussels Orchestra goes in search of the exceptional sound of our capital.

We live in challenging times, and some of the festival projects reflect on this. At the same time, they demonstrate how much hope can lurk between the notes of a Stabat Mater or a Dies Irae. How music can move and inspire us. For Patricia Kopatchinskaja, music is no abstract matter: ‘Music is there for us to do something with it. Even when it has no concrete message or function, it appeals to us. It wants to be heard. I don't believe in absolute music. Not really.'

Let the celebration begin!

Joost Fonteyne, intendant
Jan Raes, chairman
Chantal Pattyn, network manager

We are delighted to welcome Wynton Marsalis (1961, New Orleans) to Bozar for the third day in a row. Each of these concerts gives us a glimpse of his personality. After all, Marsalis is more than an acclaimed jazz trumpet player and composer. He grasps every opportunity to share jazz with an audience of all ages through music and stories. On Thursday, he gave an exclusive educational concert for schools in Brussels, and yesterday the Belgian National Orchestra played two of Marsalis’ classical compositions. His musical taste ranges from flamenco with (the late) Paco De Lucía to country with Willie Nelson or salsa with Rubén Blades, although classical music is a constant presence. In fact Marsalis now has four symphonies and two concertos to his name, and he has recorded an impressive eleven albums of classical trumpet repertoire, from Handel to Hindemith. However, this evening is all about pure jazz, with a selection of works that focus on Marsalis’ ensembles, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra (JLCO) and the septet distilled from among its ranks.

Outspoken but not played out

It is the septet which will open this concert with The Democracy! Suite, an eight-part work by Marsalis. As a public figure, Marsalis is cautious about making controversial statements concerning current American policy. That does not detract from the social positions he dares to adopt in his music, especially when they touch on things he sees as core values of jazz: democracy, freedom, cooperation and optimism, even in the face of adversity. Incidentally, he wrote this suite in 2020, in the middle of a pandemic that claimed victims all over the world, but particularly in the US. Marsalis thus situates himself in a long tradition of jazz musicians who – some more explicitly than others – have staged musical protests against the state of affairs. Often, this was a reaction to the position of Black Americans in a country that continues to struggle with the legacy of slavery, segregation and institutionalised racism. A few examples of such works are Charles Mingus’ Fables of Faubus (1959), Sonny Rollins’ The Freedom Suite (1960), or the many compositions in which Duke Ellington celebrates his people, from Black Beauty (1928) to The Afro-Eurasian Eclipse (1971). That principle – to honour rather than protest – is one that Marsalis is eager to uphold, although he dares to make his point explicitly at times. As he does in The Democracy! Suite.

‘Be Present’ opens the suite in full swing as a tribute to the many people who stayed at their posts during the pandemic, Marsalis writes. Musically, this movement is reminiscent of the hard bop of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, the band in which the nineteen-year-old Marsalis took his first professional steps as a jazz musician. With ‘Sloganize, Patronize, Realize, Revolutionize (Black Lives Matters)’ we find ourselves in a 1960s atmosphere, with echoes of the John Coltrane Quartet. As in Coltrane’s A Love Supreme, where the bass and sax wordlessly chant the title, ‘Black Lives Matter’ is heard as a melody in the wind instruments here, in a musical indictment of the pandemic of police violence. The protest is also explicit in ‘Ballot Box Bounce’. As cheerful and fleeting as the music sounds, the message is deadly serious: democracy is at risk. Groove and beats are the key to ‘That Dance We Do (That You Love Too),’ where Marsalis draws inspiration from the rhythmic diversity of protest music. And where there is protest, there is also singing and dancing. That, too, is a form of resistance. The blues ballad ‘Deeper Than Dreams’ is a memorial to the victims of Covid-19, many of whom departed without the opportunity to say goodbye. In ‘Out Amongst the People (for J Bat)’, Marsalis brings out the tambourine. J Bat is the pianist Jon Batiste, also known from The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. He is a source of inspiration for Marsalis because of his ongoing fight for freedom. ‘It Come ’Round ’Gin’ evokes the atmosphere of Blakey again. Coincidentally or otherwise, this movement has to do with how history repeats itself. Or might it be people who come around again, as the historian Geoffrey Ward suggests? The Democracy! Suite ends on a celebratory note, evoking the parades of New Orleans. Marsalis’ conclusion is resolutely hopeful. He is not blind to divisions, to people who look away, to propaganda that creates the illusion that bad things only happen to other people. But he sees that people come together in times of calamity, and he hopes: ‘That’s When All Will See.’

An open view of the future

What the second half of the concert holds is unknown at the time of going to press. We do know that the septet will grow into an entire big band, but which works the JLCO will play is something we will find out at the same time as you. It is quite possible that the set list will only be confirmed that evening. After all, these musicians are no lightweights: since the JLCO was founded in 1992, the ensemble has built up an immense repertoire, ranging from the canonical swing of Ellington and Count Basie to big band arrangements of jazz legends such as Max Roach and John Lewis and works written by Marsalis and his bandmates. Many compositions have a place in the JLCO’s well-filled concert schedule, so the musicians are always ready to browse through their extensive band book. Whatever we find ourselves listening to, with Marsalis at the wheel we are heading for the crossroads of tradition and modernism. Or, as he once said himself: ‘We attempt to embrace both the legacy and the future of jazz, so the history of jazz is present in what is currently being played.’

Matthias Heyman

Translation: Helen White

Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra

Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra is an American big band and jazz ensemble led by Wynton Marsalis. It was founded in 1988 as an offshoot of the Classical Jazz concert series at Lincoln Center. Since then, the orchestra has been an integral part of Jazz at Lincoln Center, a New York-based organisation dedicated to supporting the jazz community through concerts, education, and outreach. Under Marsalis’s direction, the ensemble performs regularly at its home venue, tours extensively across the United States and abroad, visits schools, and collaborates with symphony orchestras. Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra has also recorded dozens of albums, which it has released since 2015 under its own label, Blue Engine Records.

Wynton Marsalis

Wynton Marsalis is an American trumpet player and composer. Raised in the musical heritage of New Orleans, he began studying classical music at the Juilliard School in New York in 1979, but the call of jazz soon led him down a different path. He left his studies to tour with The Jazz Messengers, Art Blakey’s legendary band, before embarking on a solo career. Since then, he has recorded over 100 jazz and classical albums and performed around the globe. Marsalis has won nine Grammy Awards and, in 1997, became the first artist to receive a Pulitzer Prize for a jazz composition with his oratorio Blood on the Fields. Since 1991, he has served as artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center.

late night jamm

22:00 jamm session with Frank Vaganée (saxophone), Sam Gerstmans (double bass) & Teun Verbruggen (drums) — Bozar, Terarken

 Admission only on presentation of a ticket for the concert at 20:00

JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER ORCHESTRA

Wynton Marsalis - Music Director, Trumpet

Ryan Kisor -Trumpet

Kenny Rampton -Trumpet

Marcus Printup - Trumpet

Vincent Garnder -Trombone

Chris Crenshaw - Trombone

Elliot Mason - Trombone

Sherman Irby - Alto and Soprano Saxophones, Flute, Clarinet

Alexa Tarantino - Alto and Soprano Saxophones, Flute, Clarinet

Chris Lewis -Tenor and Soprano Saxophones, Clarinet, Bass Clarinet

Abdias - Armenteros - Tenor and Soprano Saxophones, Clarinet

Paul Nedzela - Baritone and Soprano Saxophones, Clarinet, Bass Clarinet

Isaiah J. Thompson - Piano

Carlos Henriquez - Bass

Obed Calvaire -Drums