Name: Jason Moran & The Big Bandwagon
Start: 2024-10-11T20:00:00
Location: Walt Disney Concert Hall

John Akomfrah

The Music Center

Pianist and composer Jason Moran is a risk-taker and trendsetter for new directions in jazz. In his program James Reese Europe and the Harlem Hellfighters: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield, he reflects on the legacy of an often-forgotten hero of Black music: ragtime pioneer and World War I hero James Reese Europe. Europe and his military ensemble the Harlem Hellfighters popularized the new spirit of jazz in a war-torn French nation fascinated with Black culture. And that’s only the beginning of their story—their legacy has had an extraordinary impact on African American music over the past century of cultural and political change.