On Sunday, November 10th, the Free Bridge Quintet will perform with jazz super-star, flutist, and composer, Nicole Mitchell. Professor Mitchell is a relative new-comer to UVA’s Music Department faculty. Her arrival at UVA is evidence of a growing commitment to jazz and creative music by the Music Department and by the University, as a whole.
The Free Bridge Quintet concert, on Sunday, November 10th, featuring Nicole Mitchell, will be a study in spontaneity. The six musicians are all deeply involved in projects of their own. Professor Mitchell has been discussing the concert, with members of the quintet, from Germany where she is currently performing her music. The six musicians have decided to meet for minimal rehearsal time, each contributing musical ideas, and interacting spontaneously, on the bandstand, with each other and the material at hand. Long-time Free Bridge fans, who are used to tightly rehearsed, themed concerts, will be able to see the flexible energy required of jazz musicians, at work in a free-wheeling and unpredictable way.
Image
Nicole Mitchell is an award-winning flutist, composer, conceptualist, bandleader and educator. A United States Artist (2020), a Doris Duke Artist (2012), and a recipient of the Herb Alpert Award (2011), her research centers on the powerful legacy of contemporary African-American culture and black experimental art. For over 20 years, Mitchell’s critically acclaimed Chicago-based Black Earth Ensemble (BEE) has been her primary compositional laboratory with which she has performed at festivals and art venues throughout Europe, Canada, and the US. The former first woman president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), Mitchell composes for contemporary ensembles of varied instrumentation and size (from solo to orchestra and large jazz band) while incorporating improvisation and a wide aesthetic expression. She is perhaps best known for her work as a flutist, having developed a unique improvisational language and having been repeatedly awarded “Top Flutist of the Year” by Downbeat Magazine Critics Poll and the Jazz Journalists Association (2010-2022).
The Free Bridge Quintet comprises saxophonist Jeff Decker, bassist Peter Spaar, drummer/percussionist Robert Jospe, pianist Calvin Brown, and John D’earth on trumpet and flugelhorn. With D’earth’s departure this is likely to be the group’s last performance for UVA as their jazz faculty quintet.
Image
The Free Bridge Quintet has been a staple of the UVA/Charlottesville jazz scene, and of the greater Central Virginia jazz scene, for over two decades. Its members are internationally recognized jazz performers and recording artists.
Tickets for the Free Bridge Quintet are $15 General, $13 for UVA Faculty & Staff, $5 for Students and Free for UVA Students who reserve in advance. Tickets can be purchased at the Arts Box Office at artsboxoffice.virginia.edu or by calling 434.924.3376 and at the door, starting one hour before the concert.
To see all the Jazz Events at UVA, please visit https://music.virginia.edu/jazz-events.
Old Cabell Hall is located on the south end of UVA’s historic lawn, directly opposite the Rotunda (map). Parking is available in the central grounds parking garage on Emmet Street, in the C1 parking lot off McCormick Rd, and in the parking lots at the UVA Corner. Handicap parking is available in the small parking lot adjacent to Bryan Hall.
All programs are subject to change.
For more information please call the Department of Music at 434.924.3052.