Swing for Tomorrow's Stars -- The Electrifying Jazz St. Louis Event Folks Will Be Talking About for Decades

By Grayling Holmes

The year is 2064, and a group of former Jazz St. Louis students are gathered at the Chase for a gala where they had gathered in 2024. They were in their teens then, but like the kids gathered on the curb of the now iconic photo of the stars of The Golden Age of Jazz, “A Great Day in Harlem,” these kids, now luminaries in this century’s Platinum Age of Jazz, will be saying…

“I remember 40 years ago going to this Jazz St. Louis event, and Branford and Wynton Marsalis were there playing, and the room was electric. There was so much energy in the room, you would not believe it!”

This is the vision of President and CEO of Jazz St. Louis Victor Goines projecting the magnitude of this February’s Swing For Tomorrow’s Stars two-night gala with special guests, jazz greats Branford and Wynton Marsalis. “This is the event people will be talking about for decades. In fact, this is THE event of the decade.”

For two nights, electricity will buzz through the town from one end to the other — From Midtown to the Central West End. From the Gateway Arch and up and down the Mighty Mississippi and beyond, people will feel the power. The power of jazz.

The galvanizing power of jazz is set to exhilarate, stimulate, motivate, and inspire the jazz greats of tomorrow. And you can get a front row seat to witness history in the making.

Each year, Jazz St. Louis impacts the lives of thousands of young people throughout the St. Louis Metropolitan area through its myriad of programs such as Jazz Academy, JazzU, Emerson Jazz for Our Schools, and Music Heals. Students throughout the area are invited to sit, learn, and perform in Jazz St. Louis’ 200+ seat, sophisticated performance theater — one of the country’s beating hearts of the unique American art form known as jazz.

Victor and his team have assembled an event that hopes to rival any other, and will be talked about for decades by jazz afficionados, students, musicians, and anyone who loves music.

Recently, I sat down with him, and he told me, “Grayling, this event is less than a month away. We need to raise funds to support the 4.5-million dollars needed annually to keep the music flowing to kids of all ages in St. Louis. Our goal is to raise $600,000 this year. And we will,” he said emphatically.

“We haven’t hosted a fundraising gala in a few years; the last time was at the Anheuser Busch Beer Garden. Time to raise some money and turn up the volume for our community and the world of jazz.”

He went on to say that he called upon his colleague and friend, the jazz great Wynton Marsalis to light up the night. “That’s right, Wynton is the man who was on the cover of Time magazine back in the 90’s. I’ve had the honor of playing with him many times through the years.” As many of you may know, Wynton Marsalis is an accomplished trumpeter, and Victor Goines a talented saxophonist. Together, they played at Jazz at Lincoln Center and both know the schedule there. There, and at other venues, they have “raised the proverbial roof” for more than 31 years. “Although I could have called upon any number of world-renowned talents that I have had the privilege to perform with during my career, I knew that Wynton might be available this February. He agreed, then said ‘Why don’t you have my brother Branford join us?’” The rest will be history on February 21st and 22nd, as the two legends perform together for the first time on a gig of their own in more than 30 years.

While The stars descend upon st. louis, the kids from jazz st. louis hope that some stardust will rub off on them

"The “event of the decade,” as he called it during our sit-down, “will be just that, not only because the brothers will reunite for our fundraising event, but because our protégées, our stars of tomorrow, will be there to see men who reached for the jazz heavens and caught the very stars. The brothers Marsalis will descend upon St. Louis like lightening captured in a bottle for two red hot February nights. These kids from our Jazz St. Louis programs are hoping that some of that illustrious stardust will rub off on them and they can say, remember when. I was there that cold February night when they caught lightening in a bottle for all to see jazz history.”

The stars of today will meet the stars of the future.

Although the brothers Marsalis could play since they could pick up an instrument, Wynton and Branford started out making money at music at 13 and 14 years of age, respectively. Wynton is now 62; Branford is 63.” The comparison that he was making was clear. Just as the Marsalis brothers swung for the stars as teens, today’s teens are swinging and destined to be tomorrow’s stars. Stars central to the constellation of jazz have carved out time in the continuum to be role models for these youngsters.

From the music halls around the world, Scotland, London, Vienna, and Marseille, France, as well as every city coast to coast in the States, Wynton and Branford continue to command and mesmerize audiences with their gifts. “We are indeed fortunate to have them for a few nights here in St. Louis,” Victor said.

During the evening, Victor and his team plan on assembling a group of their Jazz St. Louis stars of tomorrow to take a photo with two legendary jazz luminaries of today. “As I have said, long after I’m gone, in decades to come, the young people will look at their faces immortalized faces in the photo taken at the Chase and say, ‘I WAS THERE THAT NIGHT!’ Our very own version of “A Great Day in Harlem” might someday become “A Great Night in St. Louis.”

Pictured below is a semblance of the picture we want to recreate. In the photo are the best and most accomplished jazz greats from the era. Legends like Count Basie, Benny Golson, Dizzy Gillespie, Gerry Mulligan, Sonny Rollins, and Thelonious Monk pepper the picture of the 57 gathered on the stoop of a stately Harlem Brownstone on August 12, 1958. Of note are the young kids sitting on the curb next to Louis Armstrong. Many are among the jazz legends of today. This February, although we will only have two greats here, their megawatt power will shine. “Combined with the adulation from our Jazz St. Louis “curbside” kids, we will get one helluva photo,” Victor said with a smile that lit up the Jazz St. Louis boardroom we were in.

This picture shows the day when 57 legendary jazz musicians gathered in front of a Harlem townhouse in 1958. It became known as “A Great Day in Harlem.” The picture was later the subject of a 1998 film by the same title. Many of kids sitting on the curb are now jazz legends in their own right and still buzzing about the day they were there when the photo was taken.

The night will be electric as jazz st. louis swings for tomorrow’s stars this february

Victor said, “The greatest of musicians told stories.” When we play, we actually do interviews with our music. When we play, we lack the ability to tell all of our story. So what we do, is we do interviews to try to clarify where there were gaps in our playing.

Again, it took me a minute to pick up what Victor was laying down. But then I got it. It crystalized in my head when he said, “Instead of just sending sounds to an audience, we try to put emotion in our stories and things.”

Wynton used to say back in the 70s, something he had learned from his father Ellis:

If I could play everything I could tell you on my horn, I wouldn’t have to speak to you.
Music is bigger than notes on a page. The greatest of musicians told stories. Storytelling is still the greatest way of education. Whether it’s Aesop’s Fables or whatever it is, or jazz musicians and interactions and things like that, when we play, we actually do interviews with our music.
When we play, we lack the ability to tell all of our story. So, what we do is we do interviews to try to clarify where we had gaps in our playing. And that’s not a negative thing.

“I’m paraphrasing.” Victor pointed out.

“Because I’m so informed about his Wynton’s music, I’m going to drop a few titles,” Victor said as if he were a professor back at the University of New Orleans teaching class.

All Rise

Blood on the Fields

From the Plantation to the Penitentiary

Black Codes from the Underground

“What do all those albums have in common? They talk about social awareness in the Black community. The black hole in the Black community. Things that are not written down, but they are holes that exist in Black America; they are holes that exist. From the Penthouse to the Penitentiary was about blackness as well. He does these recordings every 10 years.”

Wynton won the Pulitzer Prize in music for his oratorio Blood on the Fields. He is a lightening rod in his field.

“For me, Wynton’s greatness is not only as an artist. When Time magazine did that cover story on him 15 or 20 years ago, they recognized him as one of the great thinkers of his time. That’s when I think people started to recognize the power of Wynton. In the world of trumpet, it’s a very small world, but if he’s also included with the great thinkers of our time, then that’s monumental.”

This February, the GALVANIZING POWER of Wynton is coming to St. Louis — Jazz St. Louis.

Wynton Marsalis on the cover of Time magazine, October 22, 1990. The first jazz musician ever featured on the cover of Time magazine was Louis Armstrong, February 21, 1949.

About Wynton Marsalis

Wynton Marsalis, trumpeter and composer.

According to writer Tom Piazza of Smithsonian Magazine:

From the time he first came to wide public attention at age 18 with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers, in 1979, Marsalis has thought deeply about what it means to be a jazz musician. Although his brothers Branford, Delfeayo and Jason are musicians, and his father, Ellis Marsalis, is a prominent jazz pianist, Wynton had to come to jazz on his own terms. "When I was growing up," he once told me, "jazz music was just something that my daddy played that nobody really wanted to listen to. I didn't listen to it because it was 'something old.' A little later, once I started to want to check jazz out, I was really the only one I knew who wanted to play it." According to PopMatters.com: The 10 Best Wynton Marsalis Albums Marsalis is one of the most prolific instrumentalists of the last 40 years. A virtuoso in both jazz and Western classical music, he has recorded as many as 75 times as a leader, including his long discography leading the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Thrust into the spotlight by Columbia Records before he was 21 years old—Marsalis, born in 1961, won simultaneous Grammys in jazz and classical categories in both 1983 and 1984—he has a limited career as a sideman but has also made notable recordings with Art Blakey,
Herbie Hancock, and others. Beyond the music itself, Marsalis has been a lightning rod. His central role in Ken Burns’ Jazz series and his founding of Jazz at Lincoln Center, where he is currently Managing and Artistic Director, both put him in the role of defining a “jazz establishment”—and one that often was explicitly traditional and suspicious of both avant-garde traditions in jazz and fusions of jazz with popular music. Along with jazz critic Stanley Crouch, who passed in 2020, Marsalis often engaged in polemics on how jazz should be laser-defined by the tradition of swing rhythm, acoustic instrumentation, and harmonic structures based in blues, ballad, and Latin playing. Additionally, as Marsalis won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in music for his oratorio Blood on the Fields, he increasingly positioned himself as a serious composer and not just a trumpet player or jazz musician. As a result, attention shifted away from what an astonishing jazz soloist Marsalis always was, decade after decade, and how good his bands and his crackling recordings really were.

According to PopMatters.com: The 10 Best Wynton Marsalis Albums

Marsalis is one of the most prolific instrumentalists of the last 40 years. A virtuoso in both jazz and Western classical music, he has recorded as many as 75 times as a leader, including his long discography leading the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Thrust into the spotlight by Columbia Records before he was 21 years old—Marsalis, born in 1961, won simultaneous Grammys in jazz and classical categories in both 1983 and 1984—he has a limited career as a sideman but has also made notable recordings with Art Blakey, Herbie Hancock, and others.
Beyond the music itself, Marsalis has been a lightning rod. His central role in Ken Burns’ Jazz series and his founding of Jazz at Lincoln Center, where he is currently Managing and Artistic Director, both put him in the role of defining a “jazz establishment”—and one that often was explicitly traditional and suspicious of both avant-garde traditions in jazz and fusions of jazz with popular music. Along with jazz critic Stanley Crouch, who passed in 2020, Marsalis often engaged in polemics on how jazz should be laser-defined by the tradition of swing rhythm, acoustic instrumentation, and harmonic structures based in blues, ballad, and Latin playing.
Additionally, as Marsalis won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize in music for his oratorio Blood on the Fields, he increasingly positioned himself as a serious composer and not just a trumpet player or jazz musician. As a result, attention shifted away from what an astonishing jazz soloist Marsalis always was, decade after decade, and how good his bands and his crackling recordings really were.

Wynton Marsalis at New York City’s Lincoln Center with orchestra.

And what of his equally talented brother Branford?

Branford Marsalis, saxophonist and composer.

There has been plenty to discuss since the release of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom last year. It tells the story of August Wilson and other Black Americans in the 20th century who fled the South and headed north. The film was adapted from a play by Wilson, directed by George C. Wolfe, with Denzel Washington as producer. It also stars Viola Davis as Ma Rainey — the mother of the blues — and the late Chadwick Boseman. But there's more to the film than its star players, especially once the music in the film takes flight.
Saxophonist and bandleader Branford Marsalis was tasked with scoring the film, to make the blues of 100 years ago sound true to the era but still relevant now.
Gwen Thompkins, NPR, MAY 26, 2021

*Branford Marsalis on the cover of VINTAGE Jazz Journal Magazine June 1986.*

This February, the ELECTRICALLY CHARGED ENERGY of Branford is coming to St. Louis — Jazz St. Louis.

ABOUT Branford MARSALIS

According to brandfordmarsalis.com

From his initial recognition as a young jazz lion, he has expanded his vision as an instrumentalist, composer, bandleader and educator, crossing stylistic boundaries while maintaining an unwavering creative integrity. In the process, he has become an avatar of contemporary artistic excellence winning three Grammy Awards, a Tony nomination for his work as a composer on Broadway, a citation by the National Endowment for the Arts as Jazz Master, and a 2021 Primetime EMMY nomination for the score he composed for the Tulsa Burning documentary.
Branford Marsalis continues to thrill audiences around the world while racking up achievements across diverse musical platforms, even after four decades in the international spotlight.
Together with Harry Connick, Jr. and New Orleans Habitat for Humanity, Branford conceived and helped to realize The Musicians’ Village, a community in the Upper Ninth Ward that provides homes to the displaced families of musicians and other local residents. The centerpiece of the Village is the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music, honoring Branford’s father. The Center uses music as the focal point of a holistic strategy to build a healthy community and to deliver a broad range of services to underserved children, youth and musicians from neighborhoods battling poverty and social injustice.

Branford Marsalis on the cover of Jet magazine with Jay Leno.

Branford Marsalis Makes His Debut As ‘Tonight Show’ Bandleader
MAY 25, 2017 by: JAN RAMSEY
It’s worth remembering that New Orleans’ own Branford Marsalis once led the Tonight Show house band. In fact, Marsalis’ tenure as the show’s original bandleader began 25 years ago today—on May 25, 1992—during Leno’s first episode as permanent host.
While Marsalis had already developed a sterling reputation as a jazz saxophonist and collaborated with massively popular acts like Sting and the Grateful Dead, the Tonight Show gig raised his profile considerably, making him a household name among a national audience that may not have known much about his work with the likes of Art Blakey or his brother Wynton.

It all began with Ellis

“It all began with the great Ellis Marsalis, my mentor,” said Victor.

At this point in the interview, I knew I was about to get schooled AGAIN…and that I did.

I scooted my “grammar school desk” a bit closer, opened my notebook, and grabbed my best pen, so that I wouldn’t miss one beat of the lesson from Professor Victor Goines.

“You might wonder where this fountain of talent and need to educate came from for his sons,” said Victor. “It came from their famed father Ellis, and their mother Delores who was also a great thinker and alum of Grambling State University.” Together Ellis and Delores raised their six sons, Branford, Wynton, Ellis III, Delfeayo, Mboya Kinyatta, and Jason, four of whom are jazz musicians.

“I had a gig playing with Ellis for 15 years when I taught at the University of New Orleans. Prior to that I studied with him. He was first and foremost an educator. I think what kicks down the walls of ignorance is education. As my mentor Ellis Marsalis would say,

‘You like what you know, and you know what you like, but you don’t know everything, so you can’t know.’

I still keep his words close to me.”

He pulled out his I-Phone, then opened up his phone notepad and started to read from it words he had gleaned from the late, great, Ellis. I call them “e-isms.”

According to Victor, one of his most profound e-isms was:

The thing that kicked down our walls of ignorance is education.

Victor noted that when he was alive, and even now, Ellis was still his mentor in every sense. He would talk about knowledge.

Espousing another of his “e-isms, Victor told me that Ellis would say,

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.

I let that sink in and realized what he was saying. I’ll just leave that nugget to marinate with you, dear reader.

*Chord Changes on the Chalkboard* includes a foreword by jazz legend Ellis Marsalis,

Victor then went on to say, “In his forward to the book, Chord Changes on the Chalkboard: How Public School Teachers Shaped Jazz and the Music of New Orleans, Ellis conveyed his wise observations.”

Music legends from Louis Armstrong to Ellis Marsalis Jr., who also provides the foreword are just two of the many well known former students of the New Orleans public schools. Chord Changes on the Chalkboard shows that, particularly after the 1920s, public school students benefited not only from the study of instrumental music and theory, but also from direct exposure to musicians, many of whom were invited to perform for the students. The impact the teachers had on generations of musicians and music fans is undeniable, yet their teaching techniques are only part of the story. In addition to the successes enjoyed with their students, the teachers' own musical experiences, recordings, and performances are also examined. The interaction between teachers and students in New Orleans public school classrooms opens a new field of research for music historians, and this book is the first to document ways in which public school teachers acted as mentors to shape the future of jazz and the music of New Orleans. An important addition to its field, Chord Changes on a Chalkboard will provide invaluable information for jazz fans and historians, music scholars and students, and it is also useful reading for any public school teacher. A must for any student of music.

“Ellis taught integrity, and though, as his ‘e-ism’ connotes, he drove his point home through music; he taught things greater than music. Ellis taught me, and by extension, generations to come which I would later convey to my students that, ‘We weren’t trying to teach music, we are trying to teach kids.’”

“His lessons were bigger than music for us. But he taught us a lot of music,” Victor noted.

Sometimes one or more of his kids would tag along with him when he played gigs. He played for very small audiences during the main part of his life. In the 1970’s, when he was in his forties, he played in New Orleans clubs where there would only be two people in there and one of them was the bartender. His namesake, Ellis III told him the story of the time when he was 10 or 11 and it was his turn to go with the elder Ellis. He went up to his dad and said ‘Dad there’s nobody here, can we leave? Ellis Sr. said, “Go sit down in that corner, man. I have to finish this gig.’ So, when he finished the gig his son said, man, why did you finish the gig? There was nobody in the club, but you played the whole gig. He looked at his son and said, A promise made is a promise kept. Your word means something. You say you’re going to do something, you do it.”

Victor then laid one more “e-ism” on me.

You don’t know what you like. You like what you know. But in order to know what you like, you have to know everything.

About Ellis Marsalis

Ellis Louis Marsalis Jr. was an American jazz pianist and educator. Active since the late 1940s, Marsalis came to greater attention in the 1980s and 1990s as the patriarch of the musical Marsalis family, when sons Branford and Wynton became popular jazz musicians.

Ellis played tenor saxophone and piano during high school, and performed locally with a rhythm and blues band that included pianist Roger Dickerson. After high school, Ellis served a year in the Marine Corps where he performed on piano for the majority of his duty. He subsequently attended Dillard University where he graduated in 1955 with a degree in music education. He later attended graduate school at Loyola University New Orleans. In the 1950s and 1960s he worked with Ed Blackwell, Cannonball Adderley, Nat Adderley, and Al Hirt. During the 1970s, he taught at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. His students have included Terence Blanchard, Harry Connick Jr, Donald Harrison, Kent Jordan, Marlon Jordan, and Nicholas Payne.

Ellis recorded nearly twenty of his own albums and was featured on many discs with such musicians as David “Fathead” Newman, Eddie Harris, Marcus Roberts, and Courtney Pine. As a teacher, he encouraged his students to learn from history while also making discoveries in music on their own.

We don't teach jazz, we teach students," he once said about his ability to teach jazz improvisation.

As a leading educator at the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts, the University of New Orleans, and Xavier University of Louisiana. Ellis influenced the careers of countless musicians, as well as his four musician sons: Wynton, Branford, Delfeayo, and Jason.

Ellis retired from UNO in 2001. In May 2007, Marsalis received an honorary doctorate from Tulane University for his contributions to musical education.

We are all part of the community of music

“Everybody should play,” Victor said emphatically.

“That’s a message that should go out. Everybody needs to find out what they think they want to do, and like Nike says, ‘JUST DO IT.’

And then don’t qualify it. Just enjoy doing whatever you do.

We can all come together with no experience and create sounds. That’s the beginning of music — to create sounds.

As soon as we start playing together, we organize sound so that we can be in sync with one another. In jazz, we coordinate sounds. When we do that, we call it swing. But swing is not just a jazz thing. It’s also a non-music thing.

One example is that two people are walking up the street. Most people like to walk in the same gait. As soon as they get off, something feels funny. ‘Oh, man, they say, let’s get back in sync’ They get back in sync. ‘Oh, I’m back,’ they say. That’s what swing is. You’re in coordination with the person or people you’re with.”

“So, I think everybody needs to play something,” he said, “Because it would take away some of the anxieties and the frustrations all experience.”

“At Jazz St. Louis, we are part of the community at-large. Yes, we are a community of students. And not just of youngsters. Our students range from the ages of 8-80. That’s why the arts are so important. That’s why we have many of the challenges in society. Every time society has financial concern, the first thing cut is arts.”

“You know, Grayling, that I was a math teacher once. If you look at some kind of metric, as the arts were high, the challenges of life were low, but as the arts went down. the challenges of life went up. And I’m not going to say that it’s just crime or whatever the challenges may have been, or social dysfunction or whatever the other set of circumstances might be. But when the arts are there, they kind of help us get to the core of who we are. And knowing who we are, and understanding who others are can help calm many situations.”

Then I was back in school again. Professor Goines uttered this phrase:

The arts make us better people.

“The absence of the arts doesn’t mean we don’t have a chance. It just means something is going to be missing. But if we put the arts where they are supposed to be, then that completes the whole,” he said.

“Historically, the Greeks thought the arts were important. It’s not just about a pragmatic existence. The question becomes, how much does one need to be happy?”

“As a university professor, I used to always have parents come in and say that ‘I get that they want to be a music major, but how are they going to make a living to support themselves and be happy?’ I responded, ‘Well first of all let’s identify what they need to support themselves and be happy. Some people can live in a one-bedroom or efficiency apartment and be happy. Some people can live in a mansion and not be happy. Let that sink in.”

At this point, I felt that Professor Goines could go on for hours, but the bell rang and we decided that the lesson could continue at another time.

Victor’s Director of Marketing, Nick Garcia, who was also in the “classroom,” then offered me and my plus 1 and bestie, Mary Wimbley, tickets to the Gala at the Chase, which includes a cocktail reception followed by dinner, and the same performance by Wynton and Branford that guests will see and hear at the first night of the Gala at Jazz St. Louis. “Unfortunately, we are sold to capacity for the first night in the Jazz St. Louis intimate concert space” where more than 200 vendors and sponsors will enjoy the same performance that will be held at the Chase the next night.

Branford and Wynton Marsalis will perform in the Chase Park Plaza Khorasan Room.

Victor jumped in and said that I need to make haste to be at The Chase by 5:30pm.

On the beautiful rooftop Zodiac Ballroom, I can join the gathering to see the breathtaking sunset views through the room’s floor-to-ceiling windows. Before us will lie vistas of the St. Louis Arch and Forest Park.

Nick and Victor confided in me with inside information. They said, “If the weather holds up, it might be nice to step outdoors on the rooftop terrace to soak in the view.”

The jazz-loving gathering will enjoy the prelude to the kiss of music that awaits them when the brothers Marsalis light up the night.

I’m sure that the view and the entire evening will be electric. The hype is true. From what Victor told me, this Gala WILL be the event of the decade. He advises all readers to get their tickets now because they are quickly selling. Tickets range from $50 - $750.

“Our mission at Jazz St. Louis is to make this original art form accessible to all. After all, as I have told you, Grayling, everyone should play. In jazz, we coordinate sounds. When we do that, we call it swing.” I can’t wait to see how Wynton and Branford will have us all swinging for the stars on February 21st and 22nd. They are going to be a connecting lightening rod from the present to the future of tomorrow’s stars.