UWS PEOPLE

Jazz at Lincoln Center’s reigning king of swing at home on the Upper West Side by Chiu-Ti Jansen

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Ifirst set foot in Wynton Marsalis’ Upper West Side apartment on a chilly November night in 2009. He sat at his kitchen counter, a pencil in his left hand, working on the composition of Blues Symphony, which would premiere in Atlanta as part of an annual homage to

Martin Luther King Jr. Marsalis was in his Green Bay Packers T-shirt

and jeans, wearing narrow-rimmed glasses. Ellis Marsalis, Winton’s father, softly played the piano in the background. Like his son, Ellis is also an accom-plished musician, as are Wynton’s brothers, Bran-ford, Delfeayo and Jason.

Barely one hour earlier, at the Cultural Services of the French Embassy on Fifth Avenue, Ambassa-dor Pierre Vimont delivered a speech that sounded less like a diplomatic eulogy than a cultural theory. Marsalis wowed guests with a performance by his quintet after receiving Ordre National de la Lé-gion d’honneur—the National Order of the Legion of Honor—the highest award given by the French government. Champagne flowed freely at the party, hosted by the publisher of Elle magazine and the chairman of Alcatel-Lucent, Philippe Camus, and his wife, Betty, with guests such as Le Bernadin’s chef, Eric Ripert; president of the French Institute, Marie-Monique Steckel; and many jazz musicians and Marsalis’ friends from New Orleans.

But here in this house, on this night, Wynton was

quietly working away. “My kitchen counter is my office,” he would later tell me.

Our interview for NYO Magazine was the day be-fore Christmas Eve. Four days earlier, Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra had completed a weeklong performance schedule with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.

A simply decorated Christmas tree protruded from a sea of wrapped gifts. The kitchen counter was serving its real function this time—Marsalis’ child-hood friend Maurice was preparing a classic dish from New Orleans. The fragrant waves of scallion, shrimp, okra and rice filled the kitchen.

Marsalis was, literally, at home. His adopted home, that is.

At 17, Marsalis relocated from his native New Orleans to New York. It was 1978 and Marsalis was attending the Juilliard School.

“I felt I was from a different culture,” he said. “I was an Afro. I had never been around that kind of wealthy people. It was a cultural shock.”

In his book To a Young Jazz Musician, Marsalis wrote about that first year in New York, being known as the “cat from New Orleans that can play.” He wrote, “I’m hungry. I’m up here to straighten all this shit out.”

And he did. Marsalis would go on to co-found Jazz at Lincoln Center. In 1996, he was named the artistic director of JALC, a title he still holds. He has sold millions of copies of his recordings, has written five

Jazz at lincoln Center orchestra with Wynton MarsalisFrom left: eliott Ma-son, Marcus printup, Sean Jones, Ryan Kisor, Ali Jackson, Dan Nimmer, Carlos Henriquez, Wynton Marsalis

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books and won nine Grammy Awards. Success, it seems, was always in the cards for Marsalis.

On Marsalis’ 43rd birthday, the new $128 million home of Jazz at Lincoln Center on Columbus Circle opened with an inaugural program, Let Freedom Swing.

Sitting among the audience, I was inundated with the dramatic poetry and music, delivered with such gravitas but rhythmically punctuated with Marsalis’ humorous touches. It seems the title of the piece, Let Freedom Swing, was no accident.

“I come from a group of people with a tradition of [experiencing] slavery, so freedom is always impor-tant,” Marsalis later said.

While we’re on the topic, I asked Marsalis a hard question. Has he ever been concerned that the rec-ognition of his accomplishments would be viewed as simply a “token success” in an era of social equality?

“Equality is not about a person being success-ful, but about everybody being successful,” he said. “Equality is about average means.”

Interesting, coming from a relative child prodigy whose first job was cutting grass, until he was invited to play with the New Orleans Philharmonic at the tender age of 14.

Marsalis has played with such greats as Herbie Hancock, Sonny Rollins and Dizzy Gillespie. He seems to have a firm grip on the value of the history of the genre.

“I think this is such a time of deep ignorance that you have to preserve and innovate at the same time,” he said. “That’s what I try to do. Try to come up with new things, but also with old things that would remind people of who we are—because without those things, you can forget.”

When Marsalis first came to New York, he had a significant amount of experience playing music, but didn’t realize just how closely bound together the dif-ferent genres were. By the time he composed pieces like “Blood on the Fields” and “All Rise,” he knew a lot more—from federal music to Anglo-American hymns to spirituals to ragtime; jazz to orchestra music; the relationship of John Philip Sousa to Scott Joplin to Duke Ellington to Art Taylor to Thelonious Monk.

And while Marsalis openly acknowledges his indebtedness to his musical predecessors, he seems less overwhelmed by the “anxiety of influence” than many postmodernist artists.

“I always felt that I was original,” he said. “Nobody can make me feel [that I lack] originality because I can

‘I was known as the ‘Cat from New Orleans that can play.’

From left: Chris Crenshaw, Vincent Gardner, Victor Goines, Ted Nash, Joe Temperley, Sher-man Irby andWalter Blanding

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always come up with so many new ideas all the time.” Marsalis’ home reads like an intellectual history of

the mankind—books everywhere, some lying around as if they were just read five minutes ago. His library em-bodies his wide-ranging curiosities—Proust’s Remem-brance of Things Past (in four volumes), Octavia Paz, Richard Wilbur, D.H. Lawrence, Robert Farris Thomp-son’s Flash of the Spirit: African & Afro-American Art & Philosophy, books about Nelson Mandela, a biography of Mozart, transcripts of Beethoven, even books about baseball, New Zealand and tango. And then there are Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe’s Faust and Christopher Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus. Fitting, since the Germanic mythic-folklore figure of Faust has become a metaphor for the insatiable desire for knowledge.

Marsalis is an active participant in the literary world, having penned five of his own titles. In his book To a Young Jazz Musician, Marsalis touches on his move from New Orleans to New York and his mercurial rise to fame. He also addresses his critics, who have accused him of decreeing what it means to be a jazz musician from atop his post at Lincoln Center.

Despite these criticisms, Marsalis maintains that he still learns every day what it takes to be a good musician.

“I always discover things about myself, like I just discovered the other day that I should become more

sophisticated in how I address harmonic progres-sion when I am playing [trumpet],” he said. “I always notice new things about my playing—things that I can improve.”

Not surprisingly, Marsalis shares similar pieces of advice on how to be a better musician, to the “young jazz musicians” for whom his book was intended.

After meeting with Marsalis I came away knowing two things for sure—he has an unwavering belief in the power of art, especially jazz, to better life. It is comforting in a world that expects very little from art’s ability to address, let alone answer, our ethical dilemma or human conditions.

And two, Marsalis is single-mindedly dedicated to his art—a dedication that makes me wonder if music usurps his own life.

“That is my life; I don’t really have a life outside of that,” he said. “Nothing for me is outside of that, but I have tried to use that to put my life in context.” It seems a perfect answer from one of the city’s most notable musicians—I can just imagine Marsalis living his life to the soundtrack of his own songs, the ebb and flow of the trumpet notes guiding him through his missteps, his successes, his experiences.

While Marsalis is not a native New Yorker, he has very nearly earned the title. “Home might not be where you grew up,” he wrote in Jazz in the Bittersweet Blues of Life. “It might be where you’re going, because some-times it takes a lifetime to figure out what you know.”

And where is Marsalis’ home? After hearing my ques-tion, he replies without thinking, as only a New Yorker would.

“New York.”

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Hitting a top note:Marsalis performs after receiving the French legion of Honor in New York, November 6, 2009.

WYNToN’S pICKS

The biography most influential on your life: Autobiography of a Yogi, by paramhansa Yogananda. Best Southern food in NYC: Miss Mamie’s Spoonbread Too (366 West 110th St., 212- 865-6744) and pink Tea Cup (88 7th Ave. South, 212-255-2124). Favorite food in NYC: Japanese. Masa (10 Columbus Circle, 212-823-9800) is the best. Most romantic place on the Upper West Side: The Allen Room (33 West 60th St. at lincoln Center, 212-258-9800) at night when the moon sits in the window. Best show in NYC: Anything produced by the Met opera. Favorite books: Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers and Carter Godwin Woodson’s The Mis-Education of the Negro. Favorite poet: William Butler Yeats Favorite (no-work) vacation spot: “I NeVeR took a vacation.”

‘Home might not be where you grew up.’

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