The 92nd Street Y, New York’s 39th Jazz in July festival will be the the first under the artistic directorship of Aaron Diehl. Jazz in July features six concerts from Wednesday, July 17 to Saturday, July 27 in person and online, with streams available for 72 hours after the initial broadcast.
Diehl was hand-picked to expand the legacy of Jazz in July created under previous artistic directors Dick Hyman and Bill Charlap, with a mission to showcase a broader, more expansive range of jazz. He does that in this first season with concerts featuring boundary-blurring explorations, global sounds, new perspectives on the American Songbook, and more – all through the artistry of now- and next-generation greats. This season’s concerts are in 92NY’s historic Kaufmann Concert Hall and the intimate, recently renovated Buttenwieser Hall at the Arnhold Center.
92NY Jazz in July 2024 Schedule:
Wed, Jul 17, 7:30 pm, from $35
Kaufmann Concert Hall
KENNY, BENNY, & BOP!
Kenny Barron, Benny Green, Helen Sung, Joe Block, and Aaron Diehl
NEA Jazz Master Kenny Barron and the always masterful Benny Green lead a five-pianist celebration to open Jazz in July 2024. In one- and two-piano configurations also featuring the deep artistry of Helen Sung, Joe Block, and Aaron Diehl and powerful rhythm support from Peter Washington and Willie Jones III , these stellar musicians take on standards and selections honoring Barron’s own hard bop compositional genius. The piano has been a centerpiece of Jazz in July for all of its nearly 40 years, with a legacy of performances by the instrument’s most renowned artists, including Hank Jones, Cedar Walton, Marian McPartland, Barry Harris, and countless others, along with the festival’s first artistic directors, Dick Hyman and Bill Charlap.
Thu, Jul 18, 7:30 pm, from $35
Buttenwieser Hall
ISAIAH J. THOMPSON QUARTET
One of the hottest young artists in jazz, Isaiah J. Thompson had just won the coveted 2023 American Pianists Awards – previous winners include Aaron Diehl, Sullivan Fortner, and Emmet Cohen – when he came to 92NY as a featured performer at Jazz in July 2023, dazzling all with his exceptional artistry on Randy Weston’s “Hi Fly” and more. This year, he headlines. A brilliant straight-ahead pianist and composer whose music is also informed by elements of gospel and soul, at just 26, Thompson’s resume already includes stints with luminaries including Wynton Marsalis, Ron Carter, Christian McBride, Cécile McLorin Salvant, and others, along with his position as pianist in the John Pizzarelli Trio. Jazz in July 2024 presents an opportunity to hear this next-generation jazz great and his terrific quartet early in his skyrocketing career.
Sat, Jul 20, 7:30 pm, from $35
Kaufmann Concert Hall
SINGERS AND THE SONG
Marilyn Maye, Catherine Russell, and Ekep Nkwelle
Three generations of exceptional jazz vocalists bring their artistry to a one-night-only evening of song, with the Aaron Diehl Trio.
The incomparable Marilyn Maye brings a legacy of collaborations with some of the greatest jazz artists of the last eight decades – including Charlie Parker and Count Basie – to her performances, and an embrace of the American Songbook that led NPR to call her “one of our greatest living songbook singers.”
Catherine Russell is jazz royalty. The Grammy Award winner – daughter of Louis Armstrong’s pianist and music director – is the quintessential jazz and blues vocalist, with a joyful, charismatic artistry that makes her one of the genre’s most in-demand performers.
At just 24, Ekep Nkwelle is one of the jazz world’s most exciting rising stars. A finalist in the Sarah Vaughan Vocal Competition, Nkwelle has opened for both Cécile McLorin Salvant and Regina Carter, performed with classical superstar Lang Lang, and appeared in settings from the Newport Jazz Festival to the Kennedy Center. The Cameroonian-American vocalist’s gorgeous, soulful artistry and fresh perspective illuminate every song she approaches.
Wed, Jul 24, 7:30 pm, from $35
Kaufmann Concert Hall
ETIENNE CHARLES & CREOLE SOUL
“Jazz is Creole music,” says Juilliard-trained Trinidadian jazz trumpeter Etienne Charles. And his irresistible mix of calypso rhythms and post-bop jazz, stirred together with shots of New Orleans jazz and reggae, has the Creole blend of ideas and influences at its essence. In repertoire that ranges from Thelonious Monk to Bob Marley, Etienne and his knockout musicians globalize jazz with a supercharged energy that turns every concert into a party.
Thu, Jul 25, 7:30 pm, from $35
Buttenwieser Hall
PRELUDES
Adam Birnbaum, Jeb Patton, and Aaron Diehl
Classical music has inspired jazz artists from the Modern Jazz Quartet to Bill Evans to Dave Brubeck, including pianists Adam Birnbaum, Jeb Patton, and Aaron Diehl, who bring this gorgeous, thoughtful program to Jazz in July.
The Juilliard-schooled, classically trained Adam Birnbaum is a winner of the American Pianists Association Cole Porter Fellowship and counts Kenny Barron among his fans. He joins us with David Wong on bass and Keita Ogawa on drums and percussion to perform music from his critically acclaimed album Preludes, which re-imagines music from the first half of Bach’s iconic The Well-Tempered Clavier for a new generation, introducing straight-ahead and Latin jazz elements in a compelling contemporary fusion.
A protégé of the late great Sir Roland Hanna and mainstay of the bands of Jimmy Heath and Charles McPherson, piano phenom Jeb Patton presents his own more broadly classically inspired Preludes project. Joined by the stellar musicians from the recording – John Ellis on saxophones, Mike Rodriguez on trumpet and flugelhorn, David Wong on bass and Keita Ogawa on drums – Patton’s inventive genre-crossing originals swing hard and create something thrillingly new.
Completing the program, Aaron Diehl performs selections from Sir Roland Hanna’s 24 Preludes with bassist David Wong . Hanna created and recorded these works – modeled on Debussy’s 24 Preludes – in Japan in 1976 and ’77, melding jazz and classical impulses in a style all his own. No contemporary pianist embodies Hanna’s spirit more than Diehl, who has been performing these under-the-radar works since 2021, and whose explorations at the jazz-classical intersection are some of the most exciting in music.
Sat, Jul 27, 7:30 pm, from $35
Kaufmann Concert Hall
TYSHAWN SOREY TRIO & WARREN WOLF
Visionary composer, improvisor, and multi-instrumentalist Tyshawn Sorey brings his modern reimaginings of music from the American Songbook to Jazz in July. Performing with two of his closest collaborators – Aaron Diehl on piano and Harish Raghavan on bass – and the superb Warren Wolf on vibes, the quartet of musicians explores the beauty and nuance of the American Songbook, furthering Sorey’s work on his critically acclaimed albums Mesmerisms and Continuing . Diving into a song well that can find him exploring melodies from Ellington to Horace Silver, the evening captures the intimate side of a towering artist whose music is always reverent, always deep.
For tickets, click here.
92NY is located at 1395 Lexington Avenue (between 91st & 92nd street) New York, NY
