Tilles Center executive and artistic director Tom Dunn recently joined Matt Wilson for an interview about his latest project, Good Trouble, influences, and upcoming Performance at Tilles Jazz Fest on July 20. See his interview and bio below:
Matt Wilson is a New York-based drummer and former curator of the “Jazz on Stage” series at the Tilles Center. Wilson topped the “Rising Star Drummer” category in DownBeat’s Critics Poll for five consecutive years and regularly places highly in the DownBeat Readers Poll. Most recently, Wilson was named “2018 musician of the Year” by the Jazz Journalist Association.
Wilson has performed on many of the world’s most coveted stages including a 2011 White House State Dinner. Wilson has performed alongside musicians including Herbie Hancock, Charlie Haden, Diana Reeves, Geri Allan, Kenny Barron, Buster Willians, Pat Metheny, Joe Lovano, and Bill Frisell among many others.
As an educator, Wilson has led workshops and masterclasses at colleges and universities, jazz festivals, and conferences around the world. Wilson is a faculty member at The New School, San Francisco Conservatory, LIU Post and Sarah Lawrence College.
Named in honor of late Civil Lates leader John Lewis, Wilson’s Good Trouble (the name of both his latest album and quintet) features Tia Fuller (saxophone), Jeff Lederer (piano and vocals), Dawn Clement (piano and vocals), and Ben Allison (Bass).
Good Trouble consists of compositions by Wilson, Ornette Coleman, Gary Bartz, and John Denver among others.
Hello, I am Tom Dunn, executive and artistic director of Tilles Center for the Performing Arts. I’m pleased to be speaking today with Matt Wilson. Matt, how are you doing?
Very well, Tom, thank you so much. Thanks for having me on, and the thanks for having Good Trouble at the festival [Tilles Jazz Fest]. We appreciate that so much.
Matt Wilson is a New York based drummer and the former curator of Jazz on Stage right here at the Tilles Center. So it’s a great full circle sort of moment for you. You’re also long affiliated with Long Island University which is where we reside as well. Wilson has performed alongside musicians including Herbie Hancock, Charlie Haden, Diana Reeves, Kenny Barron, Pat Metheny, and the list goes on and on. How are you doing today?
Very well, outside it’s just a little windy. I live on Long Island, in Baldwin. We first moved to Oceanside in ’99 when my daughter was a year and three months old. My sons were born in 2001, and we were in that house in Oceanside until we moved to this house in Baldwin in 2003, the day they turned two, actually. So we’ve been here for 21 years in this house.
Amazing. So you’re a Long Island guy.
Well, I’ve lived here longer than I’ve lived anywhere else, so I guess I am. I’ve been on the island for over 22 and a half years now.
I think that as a professional jazz musician and as a Long Island person, you’re uniquely qualified to talk a little bit about what we’re trying to do here at Tilles Center.
We’re trying to put a flag on the ground here at Tillis Center and LIU to be one of the leaders in the jazz space on Long Island. We’ve got this incredible residency partnership and relationship with Jazz at Lincoln Center. I want your perspective a little bit about the jazz scene on Long Island and particularly here at Tilles Center.
My first years out here it was basically me and my late wife Felicia who was a string teacher and violinist. We came to New York in 92. When we first moved out, it was more like it was close to [the scene in New York]. I wasn’t really that involved out here.
But when we moved to Baldwin we started to become more and more involved. We’ve presented concerts. We had Frank Kimbrough, the late, great Frank Kimbrough and Kirk Knuffke. We had Steve Wilson and Bruce Barth. We had Bruce Foreman do his red guitar trip piece.
Every year we do a little festival here in Baldwin in my backyard called the Avant-Yard, which has become kind of a famous thing. I’m trying to do my best to really help as much as I can on the island.
And then when I was still teaching part-time at LIU Post 10 years ago we did the Jazz on Stage series [at Tilles], which I thought was very successful. It’s funny because New York is right there, but it’s still easier just to stay out this way.
Our value proposition here at Tillis, right? You don’t need to go to New York City for the best of the best, certainly in jazz and across all genres.
Oh, for sure. And it’s vibrant.
You’ve got to do stuff in your own neighborhood. I’ve presented a lot of concerts in the first presbyterian church I go to here in Baldwin. I just got the New School to donate a piano there.
We can do stuff here. When it’s smaller you get to really see the people and meet them. I think everybody wants to meet and become friendly with the musicians. Sometimes when you go to New York, that’s kind of hard to do. I think everybody that comes out this way loves to come out here and play.
You talk about having the ability to come and interact with these performers. I think that’s a good segue to the Tillis Jazz Fest. On Saturday, July 20, we will be presenting nine concerts across four stages. It’s a for the whole family type event. Food trucks, artisans, instrument petting zoo. We’re trying to make this as family-friendly and interactive as possible.
You’re bringing Good Trouble, your project that is dedicated to the message and legacy of the late civil rights leader John Lewis. I can’t wait to see how you’ve musicalized this. Can you talk a little bit about your project, about Good Trouble?
Yeah, thank you. One night we were doing a concert for Jimmy Katz, the great photographer and recording engineer. During the pandemic he had a series in Central Park where we would set up in front of one of the statues. People could be socially distanced and we could play–gave us something to do.
Katz called the series Walk with the Wind, dedicated to Representative Lewis. The night before our concert, I wrote a tune called “Walk with the Wind.” While I was sitting at the piano, my daughter, who had just graduated from Hart School of Music in Connecticut, came and told me that Ruth Bader Ginsburg had passed.
That theme [RBG, dedicated to Ruth Bader Ginsburg] came out immediately and we played the two themes the next day. That was kind of the genesis of this.
I had been hired already to be the conductor of the Kansas All State Jazz Ensemble, which usually means you fly out there, send some music out, conduct them, rehearse them. But this time I decided with my good friend and frequent collaborator, Jeff Lederer, that I wanted to do this [Good Trouble] with the Kansas State kids.
I got some commission money from the Teachers Music Association in Kansas and Jeff arranged the Good Trouble themes for big band.
It’s three movements: “Ruth Bader Ginsburg”, who we call RBG, “Walk with the Wind,” and “Good Trouble.”
The Kansas kids played amazingly. They really brought it to life. I also found it really powerful that a group from the middle of the Heartland was doing this piece and that they were really into.
To show my gratitude for their hard work, I arranged for three people to come on and speak with them.
Don Clement, who will be with me [at Tilles Jazz Fest], came on. She teaches at Metro State in Denver. Nick Dunston, who’s a former student of mine at the New School, came on and spoke to them because he’s closer to their age. I called my good friend, Wynton Marsalis. He came on and talked with them for about an hour and a half. They had a bunch of questions. It was really great.
Amazing. Let’s talk a little bit about your ensemble for Good Trouble. You mentioned Jeff Lederer and Don Clement, Tia Fuller, Ben Allison.
I assembled this particular ensemble to go back and play a festival in my hometown, the Rootabaga Jazz Festival, which is in Galesburg, Illinois. So I assembled this group and it was so great that I said, well, I want to make a record with this band.
We made this recording on June 8th of 2023 and it came out June 15th of this year. It’s been out a little over a month and it’s been doing really really well. So far we’ve been very fortunate. We played a nice run at Birdland and we were just at the Iowa City Jazz Festival last weekend, which was great.
You were just talking about your home. You grew up in Knoxville, is that right?
Yeah, Knoxville, Illinois, which is the town adjacent to Galesburg. The whole area is pretty rich culturally.
Like everything, has that influenced your approach to music?
By all means. Carl Sandberg is from Galesburg. Dorothea Tanning, the great painter is from there. Armando Guitala, who was principal trumpet with the Boston Symphony for many years, went to my high school. He graduated 40 years before I did. When I was growing up, there was a lot of live music.
This festival [Rootabaga Jazz Festival], there’s a couple nights of jazz three.
When I introduced you, I talked about some of the industry’s biggest names that you’ve had the incredible honor of working with. Can you speak a little bit about some of those more legendary folks and the influence they’ve had on you?
I’ve been given a lot of gifts from being with these folks. And I’ve also been very fortunate in my career to have apprenticed with a lot of these master musicians. And also to play with the people in between: my peers and now a lot of young people. I have a new group with some very young people.
Don Clement and Tia Fuller [are members of Good Trouble]. Last week, Aneesha Rush played with us in Iowa City and Mimi Jones was playing with us this weekend. They’re younger, so I’m used to that now. For a while, you’re the youngest person in the band, then you’re the same.
But I still do a lot of stuff with my peers.
I’ve been very fortunate. I was given a lot of freedom to be myself from the very get-go; from my parents and from the musicians I was around in my hometown and when I moved to Wichita for school.
And in my professional life I’ve been very fortunate to have been around people that allowed me to cultivate my imagination and gave me permission to try things. Dewey Redman, for example, who I played with for 12 years and Lee Konin, who I played with for even longer. Charlie Haden died 10 years ago, but I played with him from 2004 until 2014, when he passed.
Carla Blay, Andrew Hill.
The list goes on and on. Folks like Kenny Baron and Pat Matheny and Bill Frisell and John Schofield and Joe Lovano and Greg Osby.
I think you’ve accurately described it as a gift, right?
Yeah, it really is. And they’re my friends. That’s what’s wild.
When I was younger I used to love to be at festivals and just see the musicians. But now I’m part of that scene and part of the community. I know such a wide range of musicians. I saw a quote that said it takes an hour to play the set and two hours to say hey to everybody and it’s great I love that.
And Matt, in that vein, who are you looking forward to seeing at the Tillis Jazz Fest? I mean, we’ve got a nice roster that we co-curated.
I love Sean Mason. I heard him on the jazz cruise with Wynton a couple of years ago. I’m a huge fan of Brandee’s. Matter of fact, I booked her for a series that we had in the atrium here at Tilles.
I’m looking forward to Harborfields High school. I’m looking forward to the whole spectrum.
I’m fortunately working that evening at Birdland with Dina DeRose. So I cannot see Brantford’s band, but we’ve been in touch. So I’ll try to see him if I can.
That’s great. We are excited to have you as a part of the first ever Tilles Jazz Fest. I think it’s going to be a great day of music, a great day of community. And as you noted, we’ve got student ensembles. There’s some LIU student ensembles. There’s a couple of high school student ensembles.
Can you run down a couple of the other folks again.I don’t have it in front of me.
Jalen Baker and his duo, Georgia Heers
I’m looking forward to Mariel Bildsten as well. She’s going to do a set in the Winnick Mansion, the former post estate.
And then as we transition from the day into the evening, she’s going to lead a traditional New Orleans style second line parade across the campus. I’m hoping that all the other younger musicians get on board.
I really appreciate how imaginative you’ve been with the program and how imaginative you’ve been about reaching out to folks.
Thank you.
In addition to the performances we’re having a few vendors come. Rosie’s vintage shop in Huntington, for example, and a handful of local artisans are going to shop their wares. We’re not charging the vendors. We really just want to bring people together, artists of all stripes and sizes.
It’s great.
And it’s a beautiful campus. The campus is beautiful and the Tilles Center is beautiful and even those little hidden areas around it are ideal for presentations.
And so I’m proud to be part of the inaugural [Jazz Fest], and I’ll do anything I can do to help out, definitely for the future. It’s really nice to have this–and all of the programming at the Tilles Center–in the community.
Thank you for your kind words before. It’s an exciting time here at Tilles Center. I’m really committed to continuing to lead with artistic excellence. I want to be as thoughtful and as representational as we can with the entirety of our community. I think this jazz fest is really just the beginning of where this great organization is going to go.
Matt, I want to thank you.
No, thank you, Tom.
We’ll see you in a couple of weeks or 10 days.
And again, thank you to your imagination, to the Tilles Center, to the generosity of Sandy and Eric Krasnoff, and to everybody at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Folks get a chance to hear a living legend of music, Branford Marsalis, and his great band with Justin and Eric and Joey Calderazzo. I think if not the best band out there, one of the great bands in jazz.
And then to some emerging artists. I think it’s fantastic. People will have a chance to experience a lot of different aspects of the music and have a good time. I really appreciate it.
Matt Wilson’s Good Trouble will perform at the first annual Tillis Jazz Fest on July 20th.
Tickets are available at tillescenter.org or over the phone at 516-299-3100 at our box office.
Again, I appreciate you guys having us and we appreciate the community at the Tilles Center and Jazz Lincoln Center. Thank you so much.
Awesome. Thanks. We’ll see you on the 20th, Matt.
Thank you, Tom.
Tilles Jazz Fest will take place on Saturday, July 20. Produced by Tilles Center for the Performing Arts in collaboration with Jazz at Lincoln Center. The one-day event will take place on four indoor and outdoor stages across the beautiful Long Island University Post campus, including Tilles Center’s Concert Hall, with performances starting at 1pm and swinging into the night! Get tickets on our website, over-the-phone, or in-person through our box office.
Leave a Reply