When pianist Ellis Marsalis talks about jazz, he invariably winds up talking about history. The two subjects are inseparable for this jazz musician and educator, who will perform duets with pianist Marcus Roberts Saturday at Barrington High School.
”When it comes down to it, what I do is nothing if not about American history,” says Marsalis, who is director of jazz studies at the University of New Orleans. ”What I do is a direct homage to Louis Armstrong. Like this drummer I once worked with used to say, `Hey, man, I`m just standing on the shoulders of the giants.` ”
Marsalis` appreciation for jazz traditions rubbed off on his sons, Wynton, Branford and Delfeayo, all of whom have won plaudits for their richly informed technique.
Ellis Marsalis` approach to the keyboard has been described by critics as a style that encompasses the blues, swing and be-bop that he absorbed in the
`40s and `50s.
”The giants were creating when we were growing up,” he recalls.
”There`d be a brand new record every two weeks by Charlie Parker, Diz
(Gillespie), Max Roach, Miles (Davis). Duke (Ellington) would come through town, my man Louis Jordan, Nat Cole.
”We had a community that did not gravitate to experimental music, but we were complete musicians. We`d play dances, strip shows, picnics.”
At the beginning of the `60s, Marsalis finished a stint in the Marines, returning to a changed New Orleans music scene. ”I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what I could do in jazz, because by 1960, all remnants of my musical upbringing-the clubs, the musicians, the jam sessions-were virtually gone,” he says.
Marsalis decided that education was one area where he could serve the music, and he began teaching jazz history at high schools and colleges throughout the South. But for all his admiration of the founding fathers of jazz, Marsalis is not merely sentimental.
”We can`t control the music from a nostalgic position: `Hey, that was great, how can we make that happen again?` Because you can only have one Louis Armstrong, who was a Pied Piper in improvisation before he passed the mantle on.”
Instead, Marsalis sees an appreciation of the music`s past as providing the foundation for a music that defies categorization. ”Personally, I think we`re heading for the emergence of American music that will become the synthesis of all the things that have been developed in the past. Go back and listen to the ”Rite of Spring”; Stravinsky was dealing with a back beat!
Ravel has one piece simply called ”The Blues,” and Bartok had a collection of 1,500 Hungarian folk songs.
”Remember that when Louis started playing, jazz was considered vile, ugly music played by inferior people. Then jazz musicians were thought of as drug addicts. Now, jazz is considered a national treasure.”
Ellis Marsalis and Roberts will perform at 8 p.m. Saturday, in a concert sponsored by the Barrington Area Arts Council, at Barrington High School Auditorium, 616 W. Main St. in the suburb. Tickets are $20, or $15 for senior citizens and students. Call 708-382-5626.
