Nine time GRAMMY® award winner and Newport Jazz Festival Artistic Director Christian McBride is a preeminent bassist/bandleader of our time. He’ll appear in three concerts this month in Michigan. On Sunday, April 13th McBride joins fellow Grammy winning jazz greats pianist Brad Mehldau and drummer Marcus Gilmore for a rare concert by this trio at Chenery Auditorium in Kalamazoo as part of the Irving S. Gilmore International Piano Festival. Then on Tuesday, April 22 at 8 p.m. his band of young bloods, Ursa Major, plays the storied Royce Auditorium at St. Cecilia Music Center in downtown Grand Rapids in the finale of St. Cecilia's 2024-2025 Spectacular Jazz Series. Ursa Major also appears for two sets on Wednesday, April 23 in The Alluvion Jazz Series in Traverse City.
Blue Lake Public Radio’s Lazaro Vega caught up with the host of “Jazz Night In America,” heard Sunday evening’s at 8 over Blue Lake Public Radio, while McBride was in San Fransisco on tour with pianist Kenny Barron. In the course of this conversation bassist Christian McBride talks about Ursa Major, mentoring, his upcoming recording projects, the history of jazz, and music education.
