About this Event
Stan Kessler's message to trombonist Brian Scarborough was simple: "I want to hear our horns together." The two met for coffee to talk about music and composition, and Scarborough says they agreed on "pretty much every single thing." "I've always wanted to collaborate with Brian," Kessler says, "and we have a stellar rhythm section." That's Brant Jester on piano, Truman Mathene on bass, and Brian Steever on drums, behind Kessler's trumpet and Scarborough's trombone. The set mixes plenty of originals with standards, including Wayne Shorter and Chick Corea tunes.
In 2024 Kessler made an album of nothing but duets, his trumpet with six Kansas City pianists, and Plastic Sax said Two's Company "may be the most valuable release of the year to emerge from Kansas City's jazz community." He was in the Kansas City Youth Symphony in the late 1960s, has played with Clark Terry, Paquito D'Rivera, and Bobby Watson, co-founded the Brazilian jazz band the Sons of Brasil in 1991, and now directs the Kansas City Jazz Academy's advanced 18th Street Combo.
Scarborough won the National Solo Jazz Competition at the 2015 American Trombone Workshop, his bio says, and he's played more than 60 musical theater productions, including the first North American tour of Hadestown. Every tune on his two albums as a leader is his own. Plastic Sax called Sunflower Song (2020) "one of the most consequential acoustic jazz albums made entirely by Kansas City musicians in recent years," and said the 2024 follow-up, We Need The Wind, "soars on an uplifting current of optimism."
The Blue Room, 1600 E 18th St, Kansas City, MO 64108. Friday, October 30, 2026. Shows at 8:30 pm & 10 pm. $10 per show.
Event venue & nearby stays
Blue Room, 1600 East 18th Street, Kansas City, United States
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