Hot Jazz in Silver Lake

LA bassist / composer Marlonius brings a virtuosic band together to celebrate human-made art and LA-based innovation. They will bring original Marlonius compositions and a dedication to jazz composer Billy Strayhorn.

Billy Strayhorn (1915-1967) is a pioneer of modern jazz, whose dreamy compositions bridged popular song and adventurous big band orchestration beyond the Swing Era.
Strayhorn is known today as the composer of Duke Ellington's signature theme song "Take the 'A' Train" (1941), a hallmark of the Swing Era and one of the most significant Black American anthems about Black life in Harlem, during Jim Crow America.
Billy Strayhorn was Duke Ellington's longest musical collaborator and co-composer. They worked closely for 28 years until Strayhorn's sudden death, age 51. Strayhorn contributed 40% of Ellington's music performed by his world famous Duke Ellington Orchestra. However, Billy Strayhorn was always in the shadows of Ellington. Strayhorn went uncredited for too much of his contributions live and in-studio. He wasn't paid fairly, and the press squeezed Strayhorn out of the limelight because he was openly gay at a time where queer artists were heavily barred from opportunity.
Marlonius makes an effort to uncover many of Billy Strayhorn's unknown, and largely forgotten masterpieces that shed light on the trajectory of jazz following his influence.