Marsalis family featured on forthcoming concert CD

Date: 06/24/2010
Publication: The Times-Picayune
Author: Keith Spera

Marsalis Music, the record label founded by saxophonist Branford Marsalis, will release a live album featuring his family on August 24.Branford Marsalis

“Music Redeems” was recorded at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. in June 2009 when patriarch and pianist Ellis Marsalis received the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

The performance featured Ellis, Branford, trumpeter Wynton, trombonist Delfeayo, drummer Jason and poet Ellis III, as well as special guest Harry Connick Jr.

Proceeds from the “Music Redeems” CD and an affiliated online fundraising drive will go toward the Ellis Marsalis Center for Music in the Musicians’ Village. The planned 17,000-square-foot arts facility includes a 150-seat performance space and is envisioned as a resource for residents of the village and the surrounding 9th Ward neighborhood.

Branford Marsalis and Connick conceived of the Musicians’ Village in partnership with New Orleans Habitat for Humanity after Hurricane Katrina. The release of “Music Redeems” is timed to coincide with the fifth anniversary of the storm.