Pianist Marcus Roberts is a Florida native who has won acclaim in the jazz world both as a sideman in Wynton Marsalis’ band and as a solo artist whose sensitive touch upon the keyboard leaves one feeling as if he created the performance just for you. Among the many albums to his credit are “Alone With Three Giants,” which celebrates the music of Jelly Roll Morton, Duke Ellington and Thelonious Monk and “Gershwin For Lovers,” which so far has been one of the best-selling jazz releases of the decade. Now, Roberts has two new albums out: “Time and Circumstance,” a programmatic exploration of a love affair through music for jazz trio and “Portraits in Blue,” which features Roberts’ trio playing alongside members of the Orchestra of St Luke's and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra.
The focal point of “Portraits in Blue” is a new recording of George Gershwin's “Rhapsody in Blue,” wherein the Marcus Roberts Trio takes a daring leap into the piece by improvising new melodies alongside and within the original score. Also included on the disc is a recording of the “I Got Rhythm” variations and a symphonic work called “Yamekraw,” written by the master of stride piano, James P. Johnson.
Marcus Roberts will be performing October 5, at the Carver Community Cultural Center, playing music from his jazz releases, as well as “Rhapsody in Blue,” and possibly a few surprises.
INTERVIEW HIGHLIGHTS
On what attracted him to Gershwin’s music:
“I could hear blues in it. If you listen to any Gershwin pieces, you can definitely hear he was about trying to get some blues. If you hear the hundreds of popular songs that he did, or if you listen to the solo repertoire that he wrote, or the F Concerto, of course, ‘Rhapsody In Blue,’ it's all there.”
On whether Gershwin would have moved further into jazz, had he lived longer:
“No question about it. George Gershwin knew what was happening. He was a very intelligent man. He was a very cultured man. He knew that jazz was the new music. There was no question about it… but what he wanted to do was to kind of combine the European and the American sensibility. But unfortunately for him, jazz music hadn't developed yet, see? But he could see very clearly that this would be the new direction. So now 70 years later, I can assure you that he was right, and what you're going to see in the next 100 years is people are going to become less and less afraid of combining those abilities, and you’ll start to have young people who are being trained both very well in classical music and they'll be able to improvise jazz very well.”
