Tony nominees Dee Dee Bridgewater and Delroy Lindo have been tapped as co-hosts for the inaugural Jazz Music Awards, set for Saturday, Oct. 22, at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Atlanta. Bridgewater was Tony-nominated for her featured performance in The Wiz (1975). Lindo was nominated for his featured performance in Joe Turner’s Come and Gone (1988).
Bridgewater is also a two-time Grammy winner for separate albums in which she paid tribute to jazz legends Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday.
Dianne Reeves, Kenny Garrett, Marcus and Jean Baylor of The Baylor Project, Somi, Lindsey Webster, guitarist Brian Bromberg, harpist Brandee Younger, and pianist Orrin Evans have been added as performers, joining previously announced performers Bridgewater, Ledisi, Lizz Wright and Jazzmeia Horn.
The show will open with a performance by The Baylor Project, joined by Reeves and Horn. The show will also include a musical tribute, “Songs of Social Justice,” also featuring Reeves and Horn, along with Bridgewater, Ledisi, and Wright.
Garrett and Evans will honor McCoy Tyner, who is posthumously receiving the Jazz Legend Award. Organist Ray Angry, guitarist Mark Whitfield, and saxophonist Marcus Strickland will perform in a medley in honor of three jazz musicians who died this year — Joey DeFrancesco, Ramsey Lewis and Pharoah Sande
Bassist James Genus, trumpeter Milena Casado, drummer Nikki Glaspie, pianist Orrin Evans, and DJ and percussionist Kassa Overall are also in the band assembled by musical director Terri Lyne Carrington.
The Jazz Music Awards will present awards in eight competitive categories as well as six special honors.
The Jazz Music Awards is a nonprofit division of Jazz 91.9 WCLK at Clark Atlanta University, the HBCU owner and licensee of WCLK. For updates, visit jazzmusicawards.com.
