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Detroit Jazz Festival 2024: The Year of Alice
Courtesy Detroit Jazz Festival Jeff Dunn
The four day event in Detroit presents the music in the center of one of the great jazz cities in the world.
Hart Plaza & Campus Martius
Detroit, MI
August 30-September 2, 2024
An annual pilgrimage to the Detroit Jazz Festival allows a jazz fan, or in this case, a jazz journalist, to reset to an internal default setting for what this music means to us on a very personal and spiritual level. The world's largest free jazz festival removes financial barriers of access and brings the music to the people, whether you are a Detroit local, or traveling a substantial distance to be present. While other festivals around the world take the music from its natural, urban digs, to an idyllic setting, the four day event in Detroit presents the music in the center of one of the great jazz cities in the world. This city that has produced jazz icons like
Alice Coltrane
piano1937 - 2007
Elvin Jones
drums1927 - 2004
Joe Henderson
saxophone1937 - 2001
Betty Carter
vocals1929 - 1998
Ron Carter
bassb.1937
Marcus Belgrave
trumpet1936 - 2015
Last year's Friday night opener was focused on the legacy of the late Gretchen C. Valade, whose generous support of the festival and all things jazz in Detroit, allows the event to retain its status as a free festival, drawing more than 300,000 annually. This year, Valade's angel-like status was once again celebrated with the opening of the Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center at Wayne State University. Featuring a 325-seat concert / performance space named "Detroit Jazz Hall," and a downstairs nightclub dubbed Dee Dee Bridgewater's named for the legendary Detroit jazz artist, the refurbished classic building is yet another gem gifted to the Detroit jazz community by Valade. Late night sets were presented each evening after the core of performances had finished at Hart Plaza and Campus Martius, the mainstage areas along the Detroit River Walk and in Cadillac Square downtown.
Just for extra measure, the Valade center staged a grand opening on Thursday evening preceding the usual Friday night opener. The opening night reception and performances were simulcasted on a large screen at Campus Martius, including a stunning set by Bridgewater with the Wayne State Jazz Legacy Big Band, in her namesake space.
Brandee Younger
harpb.1983
Dorothy Ashby
harp1932 - 1996
"The Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center will enhance Wayne State's Department of Music and local community, while welcoming national and international jazz artists to a state-of-the-art facility designed for music performances, live streaming and recording," said Hasan Elahi, dean of the College of Fine, Performing and Communication Arts. "This will provide a unique opportunity for the university to continue its contribution to the rich musical legacy of our city and widen its impact for current and future generations."
The Valade center also staged late night sets each evening at 10:30, adding to the late night fun that also includes after-hours jam sessions at the iconic Cliff Bell's jazz club. The festival in past years had held jam sessions in the ballrooms at the Detroit Marriott at Renaissance Center, but had to abandon the sessions due to fire code concerns. The Valade Center provides two venues to accommodate after hours activity for the festival. Sets featuring The
Kurt Rosenwinkel
guitarb.1970
Jon Cowherd
pianoThe opening of the center shed light on Valade's remarkable support of jazz in Detroit, extending beyond the festival to impact up and coming artists that will carry the music forward. It is the kind of support all cities dream of and seldom receive. While much of the corporate support that touches jazz emanates from generous donors who are not necessarily engaged with the jazz community, Valade was a true lover of the music, who wrote and performed jazz. It was in her soul, part of who she was. That love and care for jazz is ultimately what led to her gift that remains ongoing generation to generation. Her grand investment in the city's jazz culture also includes the Dirty Dog Jazz Cafe in Grosse Pointe, and the world renowned Mack Avenue record label. Valade passed away in December of 2022 at 97 years of age, leaving a living legacy that touches, and will continue to impact, many thousands of lives annually.
Opening Night: An Homage to a Sister of Detroit
The threat of passing thunderstorms loomed over the opening night festivities at Hart Plaza, with temperatures hovering around ninety degrees with high humidity. A massive line began to form to gain entrance into Hart Plaza to take in festival artist-in- residence
Brian Blade
drumsb.1970
Alice Coltrane
piano1937 - 2007
After considering the massive effort and time required to move the performance indoors, the festival staff made a decision to cancel the Friday night performance that is normally staged before a massive audience. The performance would be live streamed from the Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center at Wayne State University with no live audience, save members of the press and the entourage surrounding the band. It required a skill set acquired by the festival during the Covid years of 2020 and 2021, when the festival reached millions without a live audience via the strength of their newly found broadcast skills. For the safety of all, that same approach would be used for the 2024 Friday night performance, with the following three days of the festival back to normal. The weather forecast was favorable looking forward through Monday. This announcement was made by festival director " data-original-title="" title="">Chris Collins in the proverbial nick of time.
"Due to the impending severe weather conditions projected to impact Hart Plaza during tonight's scheduled performances and acting out of an abundance of caution and the safety of our patrons and artists, we have decided to present both concerts, Translinear Light The Music of Alice Coltrane, and Brian Blade & The Fellowship Band as live streamed only performances from the Gretchen C. Valade Center.These presentations will be live streamed for free on our website."
Moving the performance to the new digs at Wayne State was a massive undertaking, including moving a precious commodity—Alice Coltrane's gold harp. Younger would perform on the instrument that evening. In addition, the band lost its rehearsal time in the process, augmented by the fact that the performance included a twenty-five-member chamber orchestra. Details right down to tuning the piano at the center needed to be attended to, and a sixty-minute rehearsal with conductor Brandon Waddles presiding over the brilliant arrangements of the music of Alice Coltrane by Detroit's own Mike McGinnis. After that extended rehearsal, everything was set to resume the program at 8:30 PM.
Meanwhile, the public was advised of the decision through various forms of communication in time to allay the arrival of most, but not all, festival patrons from the long lines that typically form during the four-day event.
Translinear Light would inevitably become one of the true highlights of the festival, no matter the means of delivery. The core of the band was a remarkable assemblage, headed by
Ravi Coltrane
saxophone, tenorb.1965
John Coltrane
saxophone1926 - 1967
Robert Hurst
bass, acousticb.1964
Reggie Workman
bassb.1937
Jeff Tain Watts
drumsb.1960
The performance included beautiful arrangements of the music that created a collective resonance among the musicians, each approaching the music with noticeable reverence and strength. While each had their moments as soloists within the modal harmonic framework of the music, it was more a matter of meditative offering and receiving in group mind. Younger's playing blended magically within the chordal aspects of the music layered with piano and Fender Rhodes. While the instrument itself provided a degree of magical intervention, Younger's status as one of the premier jazz practitioners of the instrument was clearly expressed. Her focus on beauty itself was perfectly offered in both moments of soloing and support. She was in a way, awakening the instrument after many years sequestered from a live and public audience.
The performance was the debut of McGinnis' brilliant and touching arrangements. Beginning with "Spiritual Eternal," a Watts intro led to the bass tandem that was a notable and historic gathering in itself. Throughout the evening, Hurst would provide a foundational resonance enhanced by the intricate solo work or "blowing" of Workman. Younger's opening to "Andromeda's Suffering," welcomed the nimble tenor work of Coltrane and the stormy timpani of Watts. Much of the music was effectively a modal ostinato, but in essence a collective chant of vibrational spirituality. Ravi Coltane pointed out that Workman had performed extensively with both his mother and father.
The Detroit Jazz Festival Chamber Orchestra provided a strong current of sound that acted as a vehicle of flight for the band as it maneuvered through the open landscape of Coltrane's transcendent works. Working his way through "Galaxy in Satchidananda" and "Los Caballos," son Ravi responded to his mother's musical calling with rapid fire passages and long tones that echoed memories of his father as well. This was music the tenorist had grown up with, and had worked in tandem with his mother on. HIs familiarity was a key to free transit within the orchestral wash of harmonic support received orchestrally in the moment.
Listening to the music that evening conjured images of the entire Coltrane legacy—not only of Alice, but of John, of their son Ravi and daughter Michelle, who led a vocal quartet through idyllic harmonizations of her music in Sanskrit and Aramaic. It illuminated the musical and spiritual impact that she imparted on generations, and how her husband's explorations blazed certain trails for her as well. It spoke to how music can create bridges of communication that transcends time, individual identity and spiritual alignment.
The livestream of the show would reach millions in all sectors of the globe, but still there were many disappointed with the arrangement, especially when the electrical storms that had threatened, passed to the south without landing on the festival site at Hart Plaza. It was a gut-wrenching decision for festival staff, but in the end, the correct decision. Putting the public and the artists at risk would contradict the essence of what music is—a source of spiritual healing and the realigning of humanity to a peaceful place. Chris Collins and his staff absolutely made the right decision, and still managed to deliver this historic performance to the public.
Day 2: Something Joyous, Swingin,' Weird and Wonderful
Part of being an out-of-town journalist covering The Detroit Jazz Festival is to become acquainted with the rich history of the music that began with the great migration of African Americans to Detroit in the 1940's, drawn to the city by the lure of jobs in the auto industry. Part of that amazing history is the independent Tribe collective of the 1970s that included a record label featuring Detroit jazz greats such asMarcus Belgrave
trumpet1936 - 2015
Phil Ranelin
tromboneb.1939
Wendell Harrison
saxophone, tenorb.1942
Louis Jones III
drumsPamela Wise
keyboardsb.1956
The riverfront stage featured a jam session that included musicians in their teens mostly, with half hailing from Tottori, Japan. Standard jam session protocol prevailed, with musicians calling tunes and jamming with new found musical acquaintances. Two standouts clearly emerged in Detroit pianist
Jacob Hart
pianoThe well tenured
Walter White
trumpet
Maynard Ferguson
trumpet1928 - 2006
Dave Brubeck
piano1920 - 2012
Jeff Pedraz
bassJosie Ala
trumpetThe new Bad Plus quartet took the Campus Martius stage during peak sun time on that location in Cadillac Square, with the actual stage and front of audience taking the most direct hit. It took the entire set for the sun to set behind the tall buildings of downtown, with the band underwhelmed by the conditions, and overwhelming in their new, eerily atmospheric presence. In many ways, the format is more in line with what
Reid Anderson
bassb.1970
Dave King
drumsb.1970
Ben Monder
guitarb.1962
Chris Speed
saxophoneThe now guitar-based sound is very visual, as if the tunes were vignettes of larger film scores. With Monder producing sustained harmonies and chromatic runs interspersed with Speed's well conceived melodies on tenor saxophone and clarinet, King and Anderson seem to have found a formula to keep the experiment moving forward. In fact, while some may opine that without the dark imagination of
Ethan Iverson
pianob.1973
Orrin Evans
pianob.1975
The Bad Plus
band / ensemble / orchestrab.2000
The Carhart Amphitheater at Hart Plaza was a place a festival goer could sit for the entire afternoon and evening without ever being disappointed. In turn, it unfailingly presented a wide swath of the jazz legacy on one stage, during one evening of time. Jamaican jazz legend
Monty Alexander
pianob.1944
Charlie Sepulveda
trumpetb.1962
Melanie Charles
vocals
Isaiah Collier
saxophone- 1998
Saturday night came to peak fruition in the final Hart Plaza set of the evening, As darkness descended on the crowd and pleasant temperatures permeated the breeze blowing in from the Detroit River, a massive crowd populated the amphitheater and plaza above to hear
Christian McBride
bassb.1972
Peter Martin
pianob.1970
Carl Allen
drumsb.1961
Warren Wolf
vibraphoneb.1979
Jaleel Shaw
saxophone, altob.1978
McBride's "Listen to the Heroes Cry" provided the perfect vehicle for this elite quintet to take off. Wolf provided a scintillating intro to his tune, "Gang Gang," a standard he maintained throughout the performance. McBride's bass style, especially while soloing, has the soul of his native Philadelphia written all over it. The bassist mentioned the parallel between Philly and Detroit, both in the pantheon of greatness that each city has contributed in major movers of the music, but also in the soul of everyday life. He spoke to the fact that both had produced great boxers, especially in the golden era of the sport. Detroit can be equated to the toughness and intelligence of native son Joe Louis, just as the same can be applied to Philly and the great Joe Frazier—both signifying the brash, edgy, melodic, adventurous spirit within form and probing intelligence. McBride's blues-drenched homage to a particular expression of his great aunt followed, with "Used to Could" featuring soft and sweet voicings from Wolf and Shaw. The front line duo shined in call-and-response fashion on "Stick and Move," bringing the evening to a close.
Of course, there are sets that will be missed when you attend a monster of a festival like Detroit. There lies a myriad of sound that hovers between Hart Plaza, and a short distance away in Cadillac Square, surrounded by an urban setting that lies in the center of this great music city. On this Saturday night, while Inside Straight was performing front and center, Detroit drummer and bandleader
Sean Dobbins
drumsDay 3: What is This Thing We Call Jazz?
No visit to the Detroit Jazz Festival is complete without attending some sets offered by the area's multitude of university jazz programs. Most outstanding of these year in and year out is the Michigan State University band led by the great bassist,
Rodney Whitaker
bassb.1968
The band's performance included a dynamic arrangement of "A Night in Tunisia," and local tenorist
Tim Warfield
saxophone, tenor
Thad Jones
trumpet1923 - 1986
Perry's set at Campus Martius represented the annual tradition of awarding a set to the winner of the festival's national collegiate competition The twenty- year-old trumpeter arrived clad in a bright orange blazer, very reminiscent of the late great,
Roy Hargrove
trumpet1969 - 2018
Miles Davis
trumpet1926 - 1991
Thad Jones
trumpet1923 - 1986
Donald Byrd
trumpet1932 - 2013
Trunino Lowe
trumpetAllen Dennard
trumpetJazz and Removing the Barriers of Access at DJF
If you are a jazz regular who frequents jazz performances at clubs and performance halls year round, then you would likely notice the audience at the festival as more diverse in every way. Of course, the abundance of younger faces stood out, faces you would not see at establishments requiring that patrons are twenty-one years old. There was no generational dominance of any sort, with jazz fans both young and old hanging in the massive crowds together and enjoying the true fellowship that only jazz can provide in our culture. It is the uniting force that we so desperately and honestly need in these very divisive times.Gretchen Valade's mandate that the festival remain free, removes barriers of access and allows everyone to arrive together, to enjoy the music and the fellowship it brings with it. It is Black music, it is American music, it is our music gifted to the world. When we gather as a community united in sound, we are at our best as a culture, joined by love and fellowship. With beauty and artistry, the music gives us hope for the journey ahead and what we can create together.
With blissfully blue skies overhead, the legendary guitarist
James Blood Ulmer
guitarb.1942
While known largely for his work with
Ornette Coleman
saxophone, alto1930 - 2015
Arthur Blythe
saxophone, alto1940 - 2017
David Murray
saxophone, tenorb.1955
A quick jaunt from Hart Plaza to Campus Martius took us to a vibraphone summit that would shake loose any sort of humdrum notions of the long weekend and send us flying as if propelled by some sort of musical catapult into the early evening sky. Vibraphone greats
Joe Locke
vibraphoneb.1959
Jason Marsalis
vibraphoneb.1977
Chien Chien Lu
vibraphoneWith the evening crowd now turning massive as the sun began to set in the western sky, large lines formed in both directions entering Hart Plaza, while the walk down Woodward towards Campus Martius became a heavily trafficked, bustling mass of humanity. Along the way, street performers did their thing and street hustlers peddled everything from sunglasses to street food to festival merch.
Following Ulmer,
Chief Adjuah
trumpetAdjuah was followed by a better than expected set from saxophonist
Joshua Redman
saxophoneb.1969
Gabrielle Cavassa
vocalsb.1994
The second of three performances by festival artist-in-residence Brian Blade was the highlight of the evening, staged among the tall buildings and urban hustle of Cadillac Square at Campus Martius. Titled "Three Visitors," Blade was joined in the core trio by Venezuelan pianist
Edward Simon
pianob.1969
Scott Colley
bassb.1963
The core trio began, performing Simon's "Country," before the strings entered slowly and ominously for "Nostalgia," another Simon penned piece. Both appeared as rambling folk melodies, with baroque nuances and jazz harmony. Colley's bass would act as a counterpoint to the melody often, when not actually participating as a melody instrument. His playing, which employed superior bow technique and elegant pizzicato, was a highlight throughout the set, assisted by Simon's brilliant compositional skills and Blade's explosive playing.
Colley contributed as a composer as well, offering "The Thicket," followed by Simon's "I Wanna Be With You." Vocalist
Becca Stevens
vocalsThe cooler evening air was a welcoming presence, with final sets by
Kyle Eastwood
bassb.1968
Ghost-Note
band / ensemble / orchestra
Carmen Lundy
vocalsb.1954
Day 4: Carrying the Legacy Forward With Love
It is impossible for any festival attendee to traverse the grounds and see every set from every artist, just as the case definitively is for a journalist covering the four-day event. One would be remiss however, not to mention remarkable performances that may fly under the radar for most jazz fans, namely those made by young, unknown players attending the annual JC Heard Week at Wayne St. University, directed by Detroit guitarist and educatorChuck Newsome
guitarJacob Hart
pianoThe opening sets on Monday put young musicians in the spotlight, with the University of Michigan Jazz Showcase under the direction of Ellen Rowe occupying the Campus Martius stage, and the Detroit Public Schools Showcase settling in at the Riverfront stage. UM saxophonist Houston Patton showed why he is already a known quantity on the club scene in Detroit and Ann Arbor. However, what was happening at the amphitheater stage at Hart Plaza took precedence simply due to exceptional young talent. The JC Heard Week All-Stars featured Hart and Childs, who performed in a stunningly professional and virtuosic manner. The duo are both just fifteen years old. The tall, lanky Childs used the full range of his instrument while effectively using dynamics to build an arc within each solo. His sound can be sweet and equally harsh when called for, executed with remarkable technique and most importantly, a keen understanding of nuance that is rare for veteran players much less a ninth grader. The young altoist's approach is that of many of the great tenor players in jazz history, with a great spiritual awareness of the musical environment where he is residing in the moment. Hart was a complete game changer, steering the rhythmic qualities of the band from behind the piano like an adept music director on the podium. His ornate sense of harmony extends from his comping to his solos, where his chordal work interspersed with melodic, cascading runs were eerily reminiscent of the great
McCoy Tyner
piano1938 - 2020
The dominating appearance of Childs and Hart tended to obscure the other talented young musicians that annually rise from this formidable Detroit mainstay program. Guitarist Bre Vendittelli falls into this category. She delivered a guitar style that reflects traditional jazz guitar methodology with a modern edge. Think
Jim Hall
guitar1930 - 2013
Emily Remler
guitar1957 - 1990
Kasan Belgrave and the Legacy He Inevitably Carries Forward
The Detroit legacy of Marcus Belgrave is unlike any other in America. The great trumpeter and educator passed in 2015, after mentoring two generations of Detroit jazz musicians. He in turn impacted the ideology of two generations of mentors, an astonishing impact on one of the world's great music cities. His wisdom deeply impacted the careers and lives of
Geri Allen
piano1957 - 2017
Kenny Garrett
saxophone, altob.1960
Regina Carter
violinb.1966
Robert Hurst
bass, acousticb.1964
Rodney Whitaker
bassb.1968
Karriem Riggins
drumsb.1975
Ali Jackson
drumsHaving a set at the 2024 Detroit Jazz Festival, in his dad's old stomping grounds was a highlight of his young career, and a high point of the festival at large as well. His premier as a leader at the festival was on the main amphitheater stage at Hart Plaza, giving it priority status among festival goers. For Belgrave, leaping into this opportunity with the brotherhood of his long time friends onstage was a comfort. Drummer Louis Jones III, trumpeter Dennard, trombonist / bassist Michael Abbo and pianists " data-original-title="" title="">Brendon Davis and
Jordan Anderson
pianoMiles Davis
trumpet1926 - 1991
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