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Join the Memphis Jazz Orchestra for a special one-night only performance at the Green Room at Crosstown Arts featuring one of the preeminent trombonists of the current era, Michael Dease!Michael Dease is one of the world’s eminent trombonists, lending his versatile sound and signature improvisations to over 200 recordings and groups as diverse as Grammy-winning artists David Sanborn, Christian McBride, Kanye West, Michel Camilo, and Alicia Keys. Born in Augusta, Georgia, he played the saxophone and trumpet before choosing the trombone at age 17. In 2001, Dease moved to New York City to become part of the historic first class of jazz students at The Juilliard School, earning both Bachelors and Masters degrees, and quickly established a reputation as a brilliant soloist, side-person, and bandleader.
Give It All You Got (Posi-Tone, 2021) received positive acclaim from JazzTimes Magazine and a coveted 4-star review from Downbeat Magazine. The music centers on themes of devotion to the past and future of the jazz lineage, realized at the Jazz Institute at Brevard where he serves as director. As a bandleader, this is Dease’s eighth album for Posi-Tone, fourteenth of his career, and features Gregory Tardy, Ulysses Owens, as well as his wife Gwen Dease and eldest daughter Brooklyn Dease on percussion. Since then, he has released Best Next Thing (Posi-Tone, 2022), his baritone saxophone recording debut on Swing Low (Posi-Tone, 2023), two albums featuring music from composer Gregg Hill, The Other Shoe (Origin, 2023) and Found in Space (Origin, 2024), plus Groves Groove (Le Coq Records, 2024), and City Life (Origin, 2025).
Downbeat Magazine named Dease the 2016 Rising Star Jazz Trombonist. He then won the magazine’s Critics Poll for 2021 Trombonist of the Year, an award granted in subsequent years as well. He is a three-time Grammy award winner with Christian McBride and Alicia Keys and a sought-after lead, section, and bass trombonist with today’s leading jazz orchestras. His experiences include bands led by Christian McBride, Roy Hargrove, Nicholas Payton, Charles Tolliver, Rufus Reid, Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, and the Dizzy Gillespie All-Star Big Band. However, it is on the frontline of small groups led by master musicians like The Heath Brothers, Winard Harper, Renee Rosnes, Bill Charlap, Claudio Roditi, and Lewis Nash, where Dease has revitalized the trombone’s image. Not content to simply improvise, Dease arranges and composes for many different bands, constantly adjusting his tone and timbre to add just the right flavor to the music.
Michael Dease is an enthusiastic endorser and Performing Artist for Yamaha Trombones, Trumpets and Saxophones, Pickett-Blackburn brass mouthpieces, and the custom repair services of expert craftsman Scott Sweeney of Sweeney Brass in Raleigh, North Carolina. Most importantly, he enjoys spending time with his extraordinary wife and Professor of Percussion at MSU, Gwendolyn Dease, and their daughters Brooklyn and Charly.
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Event Venue
1350 Concourse Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee 38104, United States
Tickets
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