Five For Five: The Terell Stafford Quintet Comes to Broward Center for the Performing Arts

A musical tribute to timeless talents Billy Strayhorn and Lee Morgan will be performed on March 11th by the Terell Stafford Quintet on stage at Broward Center for the Performing Arts in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

The five, led by New York City-based trumpeter and educator Stafford, arrive in Broward County en route through an international tour, covering The Netherlands, Finland, Uruguay, as well as Dallas, Chicago, Pennsylvania, and New York, in the United States, and Miami also in Florida.

The two musicians on tribute have a poignant and talented history.

It is said by some that composer Billy Strayhorn wrote some of the most exquisite melodies in the history of jazz, and American jazz trumpeter Lee Morgan is considered to be one of the key hard bop musicians of the 1960s. Morgan came to prominence in his late teens, recording on John Coltrane's Blue Train (1957) and with the band of drummer Art Blakey before launching a solo career.

Pianist, lyricist and arranger Strayhorn is best known for for his long-time collaboration with bandleader and composer Duke Ellington that lasted nearly three decades.

One story goes that during a cross-country train ride to join Ellington in Los Angeles, Strayhorn, still young in his career, got almost no sleep for six straight days, writing song after song after song.

This prolific, engaging new work kept the Ellington Orchestra afloat for months, and when it was time for a new radio theme-Ellington's own "Sepia Panorama" was still forbidden on the airwaves-Ellington chose Strayhorn's "Take the 'A' Train," premiering it in early 1941.

Says Quincy Jones, "Take the 'A' Train was the Holy Grail. It identifies a lifestyle because of the Harlem Renaissance. It's says it all in 32 bars."

Terell Stafford can do this duo justice. He has been hailed by McCoy Tyner as "a fabulous trumpet player, who gets up close and personal."

Acclaimed as an incredibly gifted and versatile player who combines a deep love of melody with his own personal brand of spirited and adventurous lyricism, his unique expressiveness makes him unafraid to take chances.

He is accompanied by four sentient sidemen: Tim Warfield/Tenor Sax, hailed by the New York Times as perhaps the most powerful tenor saxophonist of his generation; Bruce Barth/Piano, noted for his extended collaborations with Tony Bennett, Steve Wilson, Luciana Souza, Karrin Allyson and David Sanchez; as well as performed with James Moody, Phil Woods, Freddie Hubbard, Tom Harrell, Branford Marsalis, Wynton Marsalis, Art Farmer, Victor Lewis, John Patitucci, Lewis Nash, and the Mingus Big Band. Barth is also a Grammy nominated producer, with more than twenty CDs to his credit.

Nathan Pence/Bass is a 22 year old bassist from St. Louis who is making his name on an international jazz stage; and Billy Williams/Drums has performed worldwide in prestigious venues such as Carnegie Hall, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Village Vanguard in New York City, Duc Des Lombards in Paris, France, the A-Trane in Berlin, Ronnie Scott's in London, Porgy and Bess in Vienna, Austria, Doha in Doha, Qatar and Umbria Jazz in Perugia, Italy.

This is 'five for five' on stage in Broward County.
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