Ravinia 2024 Issue 1

BASSIST RUFUS REID HAS LIT UP the New York City jazz scene for nearly 50 years, working in all the major clubs, fronting more than a dozen albums and serving as a duet partner and sideman on scores more with such luminaries as Kenny Barron, Kenny Burrell, Art Farmer, J.J. Johnson, and Akira Tana. But as important as the Big Apple as has been to this ev- er-dependable jazz stalwart, none of his success there would have been possible without his early years in Chicago, where he finished his music degree, gained his footing as a player, and established the connections necessary to making the move to the East Coast. Primarily through Ravinia, Reid has maintained ties to Chi- cago, performing several times over three decades of summer festival seasons and serving, since 2000, as a faculty member at its Steans Music Institute—first with the summer training program’s jazz component and now also as a key mentor for the Bridges Composition Competition. But this will be the musician-composer’s final summer co-directing those programs at Steans—a departure he calls “bittersweet.” “I’ve enjoyed each and every year,” he said. “But this year, I turned 80, and to me, it’s time. I’m ready. I think I’ve made a good contribution, and it’s time for someone else to come on.” But before Reid steps down following the June 18 Jazz Grandstand , the showcase concert of this year’s 15 Steans jazz fellows, audiences will have a chance June 16 to see him in action on the Pavilion stage and bid farewell, at least for now. The bassist will sit in as a guest artist for a Jazz in June “battle of the big bands” with Adonis Rose & the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra and Orrin Evans & the Captain Black Big Band squaring off. Ravina Jazz Advisor Kurt Elling will serve as host and vocalist for the event. Reid first came to Ravinia for a series of jazz programs in the early 1990s, starting with Duke Ellington tributes in 1991 and ’92. He has a particularly strong memory of a Fourth of July concert in 1995 that opened with the Dave Brubeck Quar- tet. The second half featured a 95th birthday tribute to jazz pio- neer Louis Armstrong, with an all-star ensemble that included trumpeters Doc Cheatham, Harry “Sweets” Edison, and Roy Hargrove, as well as drummer Louie Bellson and, of course, Reid, who was asked to compose a work for the program. “That was a big first for me to write something that involved. That was special,” he said. In 2000, the Steans Institute decided to add a jazz com- ponent to its existing programs split between classical piano and strings and voice. Leaders reached out to David Baker, a professor of music and founder of the jazz studies department at Indiana University. A trombonist who later switched to cello, he co-founded the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orches- tra and served as its conductor and musical director over 1990–2012. Baker in turn recruited Nathan Davis, founder of the jazz studies program at the University of Pittsburgh, and Reid, who “ You don’t have to do anything but play and write music. It’s very exciting. And that’s very different for people. ” Top: Rufus Reid chats with Billy Childs during the workshop rehearsals of the inaugural Ravinia Steans Music Institute Bridges Composition Competition in 2018. Bottom: Reid performs his trio Beguiled for trombone, marimba, and bass as part of the concert presenting the first Bridges-winning works. RAVINIA.ORG  • RAVINIAMAGAZINE 89