The Jazz Gallery Presents: Webber/Morris Big Band

Photo by TJ Huff, courtesy of the artists.

This Thursday, November 4, The Jazz Gallery is pleased to welcome the Webber/Morris Big Band back to our stage. Under the co-direction of reedist-composers Angela Morris and Anna Webber, the group emerged from the pair’s time in the BMI Jazz Composers Workshop, and released their debut album Both Are True (Greenleaf) in spring 2020.

In a previous interview with Jazz Speaks, Morris discussed how she approached writing for big band, and avoiding some of the instrumentation’s well-worn tropes:

I was really interested in thinking about the big band less as the sound of a big band that you might think of traditionally in jazz and more as a large ensemble, like an orchestra of improvisers. So it’s thinking about ways to make the ensemble sound surprising, exploring all the different timbres and combinations you can get, especially when you’re dealing with improvisers who have vocabularies of extended techniques and ways of improvising that aren’t just playing over changes. I’m thinking about that on the one hand, and on the other thinking about how to incorporate improvisation in those different ways, to give the musicians different ways of effecting the course of the piece.

Before hearing the group’s anticipated return to the Gallery stage, check out one of Morris’s compositions “Coral,” performed live at Roulette:

The Webber/Morris Big Band plays The Jazz Gallery on Thursday, November 4, 2021. The group is led by Anna Webber and Angela Morris (conductors/composers/woodwinds), and features Jay Rattman, Caroline Davis, Adam Schneit, and Lisa Parrott on woodwinds; Nolan Tsang, Dave Adewumi, Jake Henry, and Kenny Warren on trumpets; Tim Vaughn, Kalia Vandever, Jen Baker, and Jen Wharton on trombones; Patricia Brennan on vibraphone; Dustin Carlson on guitar; Marta Sanchez on piano; Adam Hopkins on bass; and Jeff Davis on drums. Sets are at 7:30 and 9:30 P.M. EDT. $15 general admission (FREE for members), $25 reserved table seating ($!0 for members) for each set. Purchase tickets here.