A chat with Sunny Sumter, DC Jazz Festival executive director and ‘Jazz Hero’
As the longtime executive director of the DC Jazz Festival, Sunny Sumter has guided the festival through over a...
Category: Interviews
Nicole Saphos brings in new voices — and refines her own — on ‘Takoma Sessions’
On her third album, the bassist and singer-songwriter Nicole Saphos introduces a slightly more intimate voice. She also introduces...
‘This is Black America standing up:’ a conversation with Katea Stitt about jazz and justice in D.C.
The murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of law enforcement have prompted a watershed moment...
Ben Williams speaks up, and sings out, on ‘I Am a Man’
After the 2016 presidential election, bassist Ben Williams began a new project to address the changing social climate in...
Melissa Aldana has burgeoning ‘Visions’ for her quartet
Melissa Aldana’s 2019 album Visions represents a new horizon for the tenor saxophonist. The 31-year-old, winner of the 2013...
Ahmad Jamal on having a ‘spiritual anchor,’ remembering Jimmy Heath and the world beyond the piano
Ahmad Jamal first sat down at a piano at the age of 3; was playing Liszt and Ellington by...
‘Every time something happened I found myself at the piano’: Elijah Jamal Balbed takes ‘Karma Suite’ to Kennedy Center
When Elijah Jamal Balbed premiered the “The Karma Suite,” his first long-form composition, at the final Union Arts D.C....
Ken Avis isn’t a doctor, but he plays the ‘Antidote’ on the radio
Ken Avis is perhaps best known as a guitarist in the worldly jazz group Veronneau, but he has always...
Simone Baron is out to make ‘genre-fluid’ music
I first met Simone Baron just a few weeks ago, at the Wednesday night jam session at Mr. Henry’s...
How Braxton Cook found his voice (literally) and became a rising star in jazz
Saxophonist Braxton Cook seemed to be following the recognizable trajectory of a young D.C. jazz musician — then he...