Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis

Wynton Marsalis, Music Director and Trumpet

Marsalis is the Managing and Artistic Director of the Jazz at Lincoln Center (JLC). From 1981 to date, he has performed nearly 4,800 concerts in over 60 countries. He made his recording debut as a leader in 1982 and has since recorded 110 jazz and classical albums, four alternative records, and released five DVDs – comprising over 1,500 songs. Marsalis is the winner of nine Grammy Awards, and the only musician to win a Grammy in two categories, jazz and classical, during the same year (1983, 1984). His oratorio Blood on the Fields was the first jazz composition to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music.

Marsalis has solidified himself as an internationally acclaimed musician, composer and bandleader, educator and advocate of American culture. As a composer, his body of work includes over 600 original songs, 11 ballets, four symphonies, eight suites, two chamber pieces, one string quartet, two masses, one violin concerto, and one tuba concerto. He is also a globally respected teacher and spokesman for music education. For Jazz, he led the effort to construct JLC’s Frederick P. Rose Hall – the first education, performance, and broadcast facility devoted to jazz, opened in 2004. He conducts educational programmes for students of all ages and hosts the popular Jazz for Young People concerts produced by JLC. He is also the Founding Director of Jazz Studies at The Juilliard School.

Having been appointed Messenger of Peace by United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan in 2001, Marsalis has received a number of accolades, from The National Medal of Arts (2005) to The National Medal of Humanities (2016). In 2021, he and JLC were awarded the Key to New York City by Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra

The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra (JLCO) has been the centre’s resident orchestra since 1988, spending over a third of the year on tours across the world. Under music director Wynton Marsalis, the orchestra performs a vast repertoire, from rare historic compositions to commissioned works, including compositions and arrangements by Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Fletcher Henderson, and current and former JLCO members Wynton Marsalis, Wycliffe Gordon, and Ted Nash.

Throughout the last decade, JLCO has performed with many of the world’s leading symphony orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, Berliner Philharmoniker, London Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra amongst many others. Marsalis’ three major works for full symphony orchestra and jazz orchestra, All Rise – Symphony No. 1 (1999), Swing Symphony – Symphony No. 3 (2010), and The Jungle – Symphony No. 4 (2016), continue to be the focal point of JLCO’s symphonic collaborations.

Education is a major part of Jazz at Lincoln Center’s mission; its educational activities, many of which feature JLCO members, include the celebrated Jazz for Young People family concert series, the Essentially Ellington High School Jazz Band Competition & Festival, the Jazz for Young People Curriculum.