Wynton Marsalis official web site

WBGO Jazz 88.3FM will broadcast the 2010 NEA Jazz Masters Awards Ceremony & Concert taking place on Tuesday, January 12 at 7:30PM in the Rose Theater at Frederick P. Rose Hall, home of Jazz at Lincoln Center at Broadway at 60th Street. The performance will feature the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis in a program dedicated to the 2010 honorees’ works.
Joining the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra will be many of the honorees themselves including Muhal Richard Abrams, Bill Holman (as guest conductor), Annie Ross, and Cedar Walton. Also featured will be 2010 Jazz Master Kenny Barron on solo piano and 2010 Jazz Master Yusef Lateef with percussionist Adam Rudolph. George Avakian will receive the A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy.

Twenty-six fellow NEA Jazz Masters will be in the audience, including Toshiko Akiyoshi, Ornette Coleman, Paquito d’Rivera, Ramsey Lewis, and Dr. Billy Taylor. The broadcast will be co-hosted by WBGO’s Gary Walker and Sirius/XM’s Mark Ruffin, and carried on both WBGO and Sirius/XM’s Real Jazz channel.
NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman stated “Jazz only exists in the interactions between musicians and audiences, so I am thrilled that we are able to present a free concert and awards ceremony to connect these Americans legends with the broad audience they deserve.”

“Jazz at Lincoln Center is honored to produce the concert to celebrate the great American Jazz Masters with the National Endowment for the Arts,” said Adrian Ellis, Executive Director of Jazz at Lincoln Center. “The contributions of the 2010 NEA Jazz Masters to the art form have been invaluable to the vibrancy of the music and, in association with our friends at WBGO and Sirius/XM,
we look forward to bringing this concert to millions of jazz fans and newcomers alike around the world.”

The broadcast on WBGO Jazz 88.3FM, and streaming online at www.wbgo.org, will serve to open this special event to an even wider audience.