After a long summer on the road playing festival dates all around the globe, Irvin Mayfield and the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra are playing both nights this weekend at their new space, the People’s Health Jazz Market on Oretha Castle Haley Blvd. in Central City.
The NOJO features some of the best players in New Orleans jazz in a big band setting. In keeping with the organization’s tradition of exposing music lovers to the music of iconic composers in the jazz canon, they are highlighting the music of a man who claimed to have invented jazz, Jelly Roll Morton. He was born October 20, 1890, making this is 125th birthday week.
The program will include many of the tunes Morton composed during his career including popular songs that should be familiar to many listeners, including “I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say” and “The Crave.” Other tunes on the program including “Mr. Jelly Lord,” “Shreveport Stomp,” and “Winin’ Boy.”
Another feature of programs by the NOJO, which have included big band explorations of pop music including The Grateful Dead and Led Zeppelin, is the use of multiple arrangers who bring their unique talents to the table.
For the Jelly Roll program, which has been dubbed “Truth, Lies & Gossip: the Music of Jelly Roll Morton” (perhaps in a winking nod to the financial troubles that bedeviled Mayfield and the organization this summer), pianist Mike Esneault and trombonist Emily Fredrickson worked some of the arrangements in addition to trumpeter Mayfield.
Show times both nights are at 8 PM. Tickets are general admission and are available here.
